By Patrick Adrian
[email protected]
CHARLESTOWN — By a vote of 905 against to 509 in favor, Charlestown voters rejected the proposed plan to withdraw from the Fall Mountain Regional School District at Town Meeting on Tuesday.
For the Charlestown withdrawal to pass, the article needed to be approved by two separate votes. In addition to being accepted by town voters, a total majority of all voters in the Fall Mountain Regional School District — comprising residents of Acworth, Alstead, Charlestown, Langdon and Walpole — needed to pass the article.
While most residents expected the withdrawal proposal to fail a district-wide vote, the rejection by Charlestown-only voters is significant. Charlestown resident Scott Wade, a member of the group who developed Charlestown’s plan for withdrawal, said publicly in January that if the town voted for the plan but Fall Mountain voters denied it, Charlestown proponents intended to legally appeal the decision. However, if Charlestown voters rejected the plan, the conversation would end.
The vote brings conclusion to an initiative that began in February 2018, when Charlestown resident Albert St. Pierre proposed a town vote to consider forming a study of withdrawal from the Fall Mountain Regional School District and form an independent school district. In reason for his proposal, St. Pierre said that the apportionment formula has historically been unfair to Charlestown, whose students comprise approximately 44% of the district. Facing challenges that include low property values and a narrow tax base, Charlestown has the highest education tax rate in the state.
Charlestown voters approved the creation of the study committee in March 2018.
After the study committee concluded by recommending withdrawal, an article went to Charlestown voters in 2019 to recommend that Fall Mountain form a withdrawal feasibility study. More than 70% of town voters approved the article in last year’s Town Meeting.
The Fall Mountain committee — which included one selectman and one school board member from each of the cooperative towns — convened last May. Despite divisions between several members, which sometimes led to heated exchanges, a majority of committee members approved a plan.
Under the proposed plan, which the N.H. Board of Education approved on Jan. 9, Charlestown would withdraw from the cooperative district on July 1, 2022, and form an independent school district. The plan estimated an operating cost of $15.5 million in the first year — in which Charlestown would still remain part of the Fall Mountain Supervisory Union (SAU60) — and a budget of approximately $14.4 million in the subsequent years. The first year of Charlestown’s withdrawal would be higher to cover the cost of additional hires in the SAU to serve an additional school district.
The plan also sought to tuition the majority of Charlestown’s students back into Fall Mountain Regional High School, where Charlestown’s roughly 150-200 students comprise about 43% of the high school’s total enrollment. However, the current Fall Mountain School Board said earlier this year that they are hesitant to negotiate a contract with Charlestown.
While the withdrawal discussion may come to an end, the community must now work together again to address many of the issues and questions that arose during this period. In addition to lingering debates and grievances about the funding apportionment formulas and governing representation in the Articles of Agreement, the Fall Mountain School Board says it wants to improve the overall communication and collaboration between the district and the individual town communities. Additionally, there has been more community-wide attention to the problem at the state-level, where New Hampshire ranks near bottom in the country in state-level contribution to local education.
ELECTIONS RESULTS
On the selectboard side, Scott Wade and Bill Rescanski were elected to the two vacant three-year seats and John Streeter was elected to the one-year seat.
Wade received 691 votes and Rescanski received 570 votes, while the incumbent Steve Neill received 564 votes..
Streeter, who received 315 votes, narrowly beat Nancy Houghton, who received 306 votes.
However, due to the closeness of the counts, both Neill and Houghton are eligible to request a recount.
VOTERS APPROVE NEW FIRE ENGINE
Residents voted 792 to 621 to acquire a new pumper/tanker engine for the fire department, which seeks to replace the department’s second engine, a 1991 American LaFrance that is almost 29 years old and near the end of its life cycle.
The new engine will cost $616,764.50 in total, which the town will pay over a 10-year period. This was the Fire Department’s second attempt to seek a replacement. Voters rejected a similar article last year.
Meanwhile, voters narrowly rejected an article to appropriate $2.9 million to construct a new fire station, with money included to repair other public buildings, by a vote of 796 to 614.
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