PV Voters Narrowly Approve Bond for School Upgrades
By a narrow margin, the Putnam Valley school system passed a bond last Tuesday that will lead to sweeping improvements at the middle school and a state of the art health and wellness center, ending a polarizing two months within the school community.
Putnam Valley school voters signed off on the $14.8 million bond with 774 supporting the measure and 643 in opposition. The 131-margin might not have been overwhelming, but district leaders were still pleased with the final result. Superintendent of Schools Dr. Fran Wills wrote to the community that students would now be able to learn in “facilities designed to enhance their educational experience through updated next-generation opportunities for academic growth and emotional well being.”
In the couple months leading up to the vote, the district sent out an information blitz highlighting how the money would be spent and why the improvements are needed. At the middle school, wide ranging upgrades are planned to renovate the interior of the building, which has remained largely unchanged since it first opened in 1972. The kitchen space and cafeteria would be expanded and the music and performance arts would also be improved with new soundproof rooms, a new choral room and upgrades to the lighting and sound system.
In an interview, Deputy Superintendent Dr. Jeremy Luft said enough residents believed the proposals would have a “profound impact’ on students.
“We would have never brought this proposal to the community if we didn’t believe strongly in its value,” Luft said.
Going into the vote, Luft anticipated the margin would be thin, considering there were passionate people on both sides of the proposal. Luft stressed the district put in a lot of effort to ensure voters made an informed decision about the bond. In the age of social media, there is a never-ending battle to combat misinformation, he noted.
Now that the bond is approved, Luft said the district would work with architects and a construction manager to start the paperwork for final approval before the project goes out to bid. The hope is to start construction in springtime 2020, Luft said.
School board president Jeanine Rufo said the victory demonstrated enough voters wanted to see students receive a quality education. She noted the board and district focused on being as transparent as possible and fiscally prudent with the bond offered.
While Rufo ignored the onslaught of social media chatter about the bond, she admitted the topic was polarizing and didn’t know where certain people stood on the vote.
“I was pretty confident it would pass,” Rufo said. “People are very concerned about can they continue to support their families and I understand anybody’s fear that could jeopardize that and if you had misinformation or didn’t fully understand the information, I could understand questioning anything that would affect your ability to live where you live.”
One staunch opponent of the bond was longtime resident Patty Villanova, who argued the bond would simply be another tax leading to unsustainable spending in the town. She was heartened by the number of no votes cast.
“I see it as a victory for the concerned taxpayer which we are trying to revitalize,” Villanova said. “What the district put out there was a lot of misinformation to get a yes vote.”
Villanova argued the bond would raise taxes, which the district contended would not because of an expiring bond that the district is about to pay off.
“How can you afford this… that’s my message,” Villanova said.
Putnam Valley Supervisor Sam Oliverio, who was an assistant principal at the high school for many years, said the vote total showed there is a sharp division between people that don’t want to spend any money and those people willing to invest in the community.
“I was a bit surprised that it did pass,” he said. “Where I wasn’t surprised is that the vote was as close as it was.”
Talking to residents, Oliverio said he heard a lot of negative comments about combining the health and wellness center with the rest of the upgrades instead of putting the wellness center in a separate proposition.
The school system’s bond was passed on the heels of the town getting a bond passed in November to purchase the CYO campground for $1.9 million.
“A total of $16 million in the span of a couple months of each other,” Oliverio said. “Really an amazing thing.”
