Mergers: Districts ponder joining forces - Phoenix Business Journal:

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The Town of Tonawanda resident headedthe 17-membed board for seven years before steppintg down in March. Yet he didn’t retire. He continuew to serve as WesternNew York’ws regent, and he remains as outspoken as ever aboutf educational issues. One of his pet topices is the sheer number of localschool systems. Therd are too many of them, he says, and theirf enrollments are generallytoo small. “Why do you need 28 schoolp districts inErie County?” he asks. “I’d like to see somethin g like five districts in the county insteadof 28. I’f even like to start talking about a countywideschool district, like they have in Nort Carolina and a few other states.
” Bennett’e stand is buttressed by a report releases last December by the State Commission on Propertt Tax Relief. “New York State has too many school the reportsays flatly. It suggests that districts with fewerthan 1,000 students should be require d to merge with adjacent systems, and districts with enrollmentss between 1,000 and 2,000 should be encouragec to follow suit. Such proposals hit home in WesternmNew York, where 66 of the region’s 98 schoolo districts have enrollments below 2,000, including 38 with fewer than 1,000 students from kindergarten through 12th grade.
The hearrt of this issue is a matter of benefitzs andcosts -- pitting the perceived advantagesz of combining two or more districts against the potential loss of locapl control and self-identity. Advocates maintain that mergersa allow consolidated districts to bemore cost-effective, construct better schools and offer a wider rangse of challenging courses. “It’s not only a financial To me, it’s a matter of says Bennett.
“If you had a regional high school, maybw serving seven or eighg ofthe (current) districts, it wouled give kids the opportunith to work with each other -- and to have the best of the But opponents contend that mergers bring more bureaucracy, longer bus ride for students and diminution of local pride. “In this the world revolves aroundethis school,” says Thomas superintendent of the 478-pupil Shermajn Central School District in Chautauqua County. “If the schoopl went away, Sherman, N.Y., would lose a greaty deal of its identity.” School consolidation has been a emotional issue fora century.
The state was crosshatched by 10,5656 districts in 1910, many of them centered on one-roomj schoolhouses. A push for greater efficiency reduced that numbeto 6,400 by the outbreak of World War II, then swiftluy down to 1,300 by 1960. New York now has 698 Statewide enrollment works outto 2,540 pupils per which falls 25 percentf below the national average of 3,400, accordingb to the State Commission on Property Tax Relief. The gap is even larged in Western New which had 104 districtss when Business First begaj rating schoolsin 1992. Mergers have sincw reduced that number to 98school systems. They educates an average of 2,268 students, 33 percent below the U.S. norm.
A comprehensivd effort to push regionaol enrollment up to the national average would requirse the elimination of 33 Westernn NewYork districts. That process would be messy, rancorous -- and extremely unlikely. Thered is no shortage of candidatesfor consolidation, to be Business First easily came up with 13 hypotheticak mergers, most of them based on standardsx proposed in last December’s report. These unionw would involve districts from alleight counties. for a summary of thes 13 potential consolidations. It should be stressed that this list is not reality. State officials lack the power to force districtsto consolidate.
Initiative must be taken at thelocalp level, which happens infrequently. Only one prospective merger in Westernb New York has currently reached an advanceed stageof negotiations. Brocto n and Fredonia began consolidation talks last eventually commissioning a feasibility study at the beginninggof winter. If they decide later this year that a merger makes sense, voters in both districts would be give their say in a referendum. “If it occurs, the two districtxs would be equal partners,” says Brocton’xs superintendent, John Skahill. “Both board of education would go and a new board would be elected toreplaced it.
A new district would be A second pair of ChautauquaCountty districts, Ripley and Westfield, conductef an advisory referendum in February. Ripleyt voters supported a merger, but those in Westfiels did not, throwing negotiations into limbo. A thirdc set of talks was triggeredby Gov. Davix Paterson’s proposed state budget last December. “It would have raised our taxexs22 percent,” says Michael McArdle, superintendent of the Scio Centralp School District. “It drove us to look at our budgett and the issues wewere facing.
” The budgetary news from Albanyg subsequently took a turn for the better, but officialsx from Scio and nearby Wellsville continue to explore their optionxs -- perhaps a merger, more likely a collaboration on a smaller “Everything is open,” says McArdle. “We’res trying to find the best wayto go, the way to get the best educationalp opportunities for our students and to keep our tax rate The Wyoming Central School Districyt faced a similar problem in 1991. Enrollment was especially at the high school Elective courses weresparsely attended. Only threr students signed up for physics one Voters rejected mergers with Pavilionor Warsaw.
“That left the distric t struggling to come up with a says thecurrent superintendent, Sandras Duckworth. “So we started to look at Wyoming students now attend their local school throughheighth grade, then shift to high school in any of four adjacentt districts: Alexander, Attica, Pavilion or Wyoming pays tuition for each student, a standard rate that is negotiatedf with its neighbors every five years. Wyomingf also belongs to a consortium of six districts seekiny ways to cut costs by sharing services suchas transportation, buildinv maintenance, special education and curriculum development.
Similar arrangements can be found elsewhere in WesternNew York, sometimes involvingg several districts, sometimes a one-on-onse setup such as Scio and Wellsvillre are discussing. These measures offefr the prospect of reducing expenses while retaininglocal control. It’sx a combination that appeals to superintendentx who are well aware that the mere suggestiobn of a merger can triggerintensew opposition. “What the people of Sherman are tellingt us is that they like the educatiohn their childrenare receiving,” says “They’re saying, ‘Please keep it the way it is.
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