By Patrick Adrian Staff Writer
CHARLESTOWN — Charlestown Selectboard member Shelly Andrus will take over the vacant seat on the Fall Mountain Regional School Board in place of former member Scott Bushway, who resigned last month due to professional commitments.
The Fall Mountain Regional School Board voted unanimously on Monday to appoint Andrus to the seat until at least March 2022 when the seat reopens for an election.
Andrus, who was elected last month to the Charlestown Selectboard, has long demonstrated her involvement and engagement in both Charlestown and the school district. A mother of two children, Andrus serves on two Charlestown educational committees and has been a regular attendee of board meetings. In 2019 and 2020 she campaigned strongly against the Charlestown proposal to leave Fall Mountain and has continued to keep residents informed of the ongoing court and legislative battles in New Hampshire regarding school funding fairness.
“I’m not sure there’s a better person out there,” said board member Craig Vickers, from Walpole. “Shelly is the kind of person who, if she says she’s going to do something, she is going to find the time and do it well.”
Vicker’s praise came after earlier playing the Devil’s Advocate by asking Andrus about her availability to serve both multiple boards.
Andrus gave assurance to the board that her service to two different governing bodies would not cause a conflict.
“It will basically be a lot of time management, organizational skills, making sure those roles do not overlap and spending my weekends when I don’t have my kids doing a lot of reading and searching for information,” Andrus said, “Which is what I do now anyway.”
Board member Joe Levesque, from Alstead, serves on both his town selectboard and the school board.
“Although I’m not as busy as Shelly, since I don’t have any kids and am retired, wearing both hats has not been a problem for me,” Levesque said in support of Andrus.
Andrus also received a letter of support from the Charlestown Selectboard stating that having Andrus on both boards would create a valuable “bridge” between both governing bodies.
Chair Michael Herrington, from Charlestown, agreed that having Andrus in a dual-role could prove beneficial.
“This is a unique opportunity,” Herrington said. “These two bodies, which are different, have not always seen eye to eye. Communication can always be improved no matter how good it is, and this is a good way to do that.”
Historically the relationship between the Charlestown Selectboard and Fall Mountain Regional School Board has become strained on numerous occasions, particularly in matters relating to district spending.
Charlestown, the largest of Fall Mountain’s five cooperating communities, funds 45% of the district. But Charlestown also has the highest education tax rate in New Hampshire, due in part to the town’s low property values. That tax impact, combined with Charlestown’s high number of residents with low to moderate incomes, has often fueled conflicts between the district and town over annual school budgets.
Many Charlestown residents also point out the town’s lack of representation on the school board. The Fall Mountain Regional School Board’s membership is not proportional to each community’s enrollment size. Instead five of the seven seats are held by one resident from each community and the two remaining seats are at-large candidates. Additionally, all voters in the district vote on the candidates, including those running for a town-specific seat.
In many occasions Charlestown, despite having the largest number of registered voters, is frequently outvoted by the combined communities.
This was also the case in 2020 when Andrus ran against Bushway for the Charlestown seat. Andrus lost that election by 46 votes, despite winning the majority of Charlestown votes.
Several school board members felt that Andrus, with her high level of engagement and understanding of issues in education and her community, will be an excellent liaison between the two governing bodies.
Andrus was one of two remaining applicants for the vacant board seat. Gabe Moore, a Charlestown resident of 20 years, has been involved in the district as a parent and a paraeducator, said he ran as a way to be more positively involved in the local schools.
Initially four residents had applied for the seat but two had withdrawn prior to Monday, Herrington said.
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