According to Superintendent Rice, the 3-3 split on Pre-K means the budget stays as her office had proposed by state education law.
Vice President Tobin said she also thought it was unfair for Trustee Dominick Profaci to have voted to keep pre-kindergarten, since his spouse seems to benefit.
“The husband of the Pre-K teacher is one of the votes that is keeping it,” she said.
According to President Patrick Rausch, Profaci does not have an issue that would keep him from voting on Pre-K — since his wife was due to be reassigned to teach a different grade should the program have been canceled.
“It’s technically not a conflict of interest. There’s a perception there,” Tobin said. “You don’t have to recuse yourself just because of monetary interest.”
Why the cuts to sports were proposed
Prior to Tuesday morning’s emergency meeting, the district was ready to pull the trigger on cutting JV sports. While technically those cuts no longer matter, this was Toni Woody, the district’s athletic director, justification for why JV would have been cut compared to middle school sports.
Woody had recommended cutting JV based on the simple number of students participating in both levels of athletics. By high school, only 155 kids were competing in JV sports — compare that to 286 students playing modified sports in middle school.
“I think it’s hard to put almost 300 middle school kids out there — wherever ‘out there’ is; whether it’s to go home and eat, or whether it’s to go out and get into other mischief,” she said.
The athletic director emphasized that proposed cuts to the school sports program hadn’t been taken lightly. “Contrary to popular belief — or at least the stuff that’s been said back to me — I don’t want to cut any sports,” she said.
Cutting either modified or JV would save roughly the same amount of money — about $28,300. Cutting that librarian would have saved $71,700. Cutting Pre-K will save the $100,000 needed to save those two programs.
Group forms to save middle school clubs
School Activities Are Vital to Education (SAVE) is a New Paltz Middle School organization made up of teachers, students, parents and community members that are trying to raise $7,060 to reinstate all middle school clubs that are being eliminated from the budget. Here’s what they have planned so far: The group is selling bracelets for $3 with the acronym SAVE printed on them; all proceeds from the concession sales during this Friday’s middle school talent show will go directly to SAVE; and Moxie Cupcakes is doing its part by donating 50 percent of its cupcake sales on June 14 to SAVE. SAVE has opened an account at Ulster Savings Bank in New Paltz and residents can donate by sending checks made payable to SAVE to the New Paltz Middle School, 196 Main Street, New Paltz, NY 12561, attention Kristen Conrad or Kim Sturgis. Follow the group’s progress on Facebook at the New Paltz Middle School SAVE Campaign.
For a full list of the cuts included in the latest budget, check out the district website. ++
