Brewster School Budget Narrowly Voted Down
After a couple of months of tense Board of Education meetings in Brewster where angry residents filled school auditoriums, voters turned down the district’s proposed budget last Tuesday in narrow fashion.
The budget, which called for a $99 million spending plan that actually remained under the tax cap, was rejected by voters 806-689 as district officials look to another budget vote on June 19. It’s the only school budget in Putnam County that was shot down as the other five school systems saw their budgets pass with relative ease.
Of the six candidates for school board, incumbent Sonia Mesika, and newcomers Erik Gruntzer and Daniel Heintz were elected. Current school board member Mary Cay Nilsen lost her seat.
School board president Stephen Jambor, who did not run for another term, said this budget season was difficult with many residents split over what’s best for the district going forward. He said people seemed unhappy with the status quo. The only other time the budget failed during Jambor’s tenure was in 2005 and this is the first time as board president he witnessed a failed budget.
“I believe it was a decent budget, but I’m only one vote,” Jambor said. “I think the question for the folks (that voted against the budget) is so you won, now what because I personally have no clue what we do next.”
One factor out of the school system‘s control was the horrible weather, which crippled the area Tuesday evening. Jambor said he received emails from residents that said they were unable to cast a vote because two tornados prevented them from reaching the school. Many people who work in New York City were stuck in Grand Central Station until after polls closed.
Jambor said voter turnout tailed off the final two or three hours once the storm hit.
“A lot of people couldn’t get down their streets anymore, never mind home from Manhattan,” Jambor said.
Superintendent of Schools Dr. Valerie Henning said she believes there were a number of factors that led to the budget result.
Residents at board meetings expressed concern about the pace in which their taxes were increasing and how those tax dollars were being used, Henning said. She added many residents questioned whether students attending the district actually lived within its borders.
“While a great deal of budget information was presented at Board of Education meetings, some people were still very concerned about why the budget increased every year,” Henning said.
Henning also pointed to the major storm that rocked the area and made voting incredibly difficult.
“They never made it to the polls and we saw a significant drop in voting after the storm,” Henning said.
Residents that supported the budget were displeased that the vote was tallied even though a major storm hit the area. Joelle DePaola, a district resident, emailed The Putnam Examiner that she wrote to the New York State education commissioner MaryEllen Elia to ask her to give residents another chance to vote for the budget presented last week and make provisions for future elections in the event of powerful weather events. A Facebook page has been established to garner attention toward the issue and encourage other residents to contact the state education department.
Mesika, the school board vice president, said she’s hopeful the board and the community can work together to create a revised budget that’ll get voter approval.
“We’re just going to have to work together to come up with what that solution looks like and just do a better job explaining it,” Mesika said. “It’s not the school district against the community.”
Grutzner is hopeful the board and administration will take advantage of the crucial opportunity they have to restructure the budget and justly consider the community’s wants and needs for the students. He said voters have been displeased with the district and want to see the schools continually grow.
“All we’re hearing about are cuts and setbacks,” he said. “I am sensitive to the fact that it’s a difficult job to pay for everything, but it can’t always be that we need more money and then providing less services.”
