News on the Monroe-Woodbury Superintendent Search & Other School Board News
Monroe-Woodbury School District News from the February 7th Board Meeting.
The Monroe-Woodbury Boars of Education had their monthly meeting last week on February 7th.
Top on the agenda was passing a resolution that would allow for a 10% property tax exemption for volunteer firefighters and EMS workers in the area.
I’ve already talked about this issue at length over here. Basically, the tax exemptions are great, but they also do nothing to recruit new EMS and firefighters.
They also don’t apply to people in the area who would want to volunteer, but don’t qualify for the exemption because they don’t own the home or apartment they’re living in.
What really needs to happen, and Orange County’s elected officials all seem reluctant to do this, is to figure out how much SPECIFICALLY it will cost to pay these EMS and firefighters, and then share with the public how much it would cost.
I think, given the choice between no one showing up if there’s a fire or emergency at your house, and paying slightly higher taxes, most people would be ok with the slight tax increase.
If we did enough digging into how our local governments are spending their money, I bet we can figure out:
How much it’ll cost to pay our EMS and Firefighters
What money is being wasted on pay raises and unpopular wildlife mitigation tactics. (Among other things.)
How much it’ll cost Orange County tax payers to move to a paid model.
Once that number is confirmed, let’s put it to a vote.
In Other School Board News
-The School Board is looking into having more evening games in the Fall. This follows a visit from Supervisor Tony Cardone who spoke at the last meeting. Cardone spent more time complaining about the lack of Friday night football games than he did responding to the public at his previous Town Board meeting. There’s been a struggle in the past to find referees for the Friday night games.
-The Orange County Drug Abuse Counsel (OCDAC) applied for a grant from New York State that allowed them to hire drug and alcohol prevention specialists in the county. There are now six of them, with Zebediah Francis hired to work at Monroe-Woodbury Senior High School. He began working there during the first week of February.
Also as part of the initiative, the OCDAC has teamed with the school district to hire a mental health specialist as well to work hand and hand with Mr. Francis in providing support services to students. The money for this program came from the Opioid Settlement Funding Initiative.
I’m going to try to get in touch with Mr. Francis to get some more information about the role. OCDAC is looking to expand the program into the middle and elementary schools but first want to evaluate how the program is currently working before doing so.
-The following retirements were also announced and confirmed. One of them is Maryann Ronzoni, who was my middle school science teacher at Monroe-Woodbury. So I’d like to wish her a happy retirement.
-Policy Committee: There is an upcoming meeting at Noon on February 27th at the Education Center for those who would like to attend.
-New York State is conducting an audit of how school districts spent the COVID relief money. It’s Monroe-Woodbury’s turn this year. More information to come on that front.
-Superintendent Search: Now is your chance to provide comments and inquires to the School Board as the Superintendent Search gets underway. The School Board will be posting updates and other information as the search gets underway right here on their website. Confidential comments (not shared with the board members) can be provided via email at: mwsupsearch@districtwisesearch.com with the deadline to submit an email set at March 22nd.