14

Herald A Umtern 10 March *82

Why Four Towns May Soon Be Considering One School District

f From Page 1) The forces of the market place are caus mg a number of school boards to give serious consideration to concepts which heretofore may have been repugnant if not so out of the question as to be ludicrous KVKN WITHOUT A direction from the state - and the new administration of 'Gov Tom Kean is against mandated regionalization - local school districts have been cooperating with an eye toward cost-savings and maintaining a level of education acceptable to the individual

eofnmunity

Stone Harbor. Avalon and Sea Isle City, for example, all share in providing music in their curricula The three districts got together — voluntarily - and hired the same music teacner. Explains Don Wen dorf, administrative principal of the Stone

Harbor Elementary School:

^ "By the three districts agreeing to get together and interview together and hire

for more than 16 years — and himself been a schoolrboard member in South Jersey/ He has been involved in the statistical compilation and report-making processes of many, many regionalization considerations and in the past 18 months alone has worked with some 60 school districts. "It’s pretty well known that any commissioner I of education 1 who tries to force regionalization down [the) throats tof local districta] will get tarred and feathered,” Mr. Wager acknowledges, "because the state has historically been one of local control and one of local deci-

sion."

ACCORDING TO MR. WAGER, there is what he calls a major "dis-incentive to Regionalization" currently in force, and there Is also not the incentive to regionalization which existed in New .Jersey a generation ago. He explains: • Back in the SOs and 60s (when the Lower Cope May Regional district came

Wildwood High. Will It some day be Wildwood Regional High School?

rhinistrator: "Hey, ifl owned a'property in Avalon or Stone Harbor, I could sell it for enough money to live on the mainland scotfree and still have a place in Florida I "■

EVERY SCHOOL DISTRICT in Cape May County without a high school or not part of the existing regional district Is a sending district. That means the taxpayers in that district pay - via their property taxes' — so many dollars per year

mgemer ariu , hrin „> ihev were given extra money per student educated in a high school ! h r„“r.= *f for° being ^regfonaTdistricta."* • ‘But th/t ^-^^•"Otherdistrict. Th™

was phased out in the early 60s and cbnse- ding districts include Cape May Point quently the interest in regionalism phased (which never joined Uie Lower Cape May

with good qualifications in our area serv-

ing the three schools.''

That is not the extent of cooperation between the two elementary schools on Seven Mile Beach, for Stone Harbor and Avalon have also gotten together to provide a latebus so that borough pupils attending Middle Township High School may participate in extracurricular activities or otherwise

stay after school.

WHAT IS MORE, the two elementary school districts share both services and facilities in their common kindergarten class The way it works is that Stone Harbor — with only 68 pupils in grades I thru 8 — provides classroom space, physical education and music facilities for kindergarten students from both Stone Harbor and Avalon while, Avalon in turn

* out at the same time. Plus the fact, you had tremendous increasing enrollment throughout the statq, so districts were pretty well taking care of their own, or maintaining the sendihg and receiving

relationships."

In Cape May County this relationship continues today with high schools in Middle Township and Ocean City serving the elementary districts within or near those

municipalities.

On the Jersey Cape, reaction to this disincentive toregionalize is as current as recent news accounts reporting Cape May City Manager Fred Coldren’s attempts to have legislation enacted that would, in effect, nullify the very basis of the T&E

Regional District), Sea Isle City, Woodbine, Upper Township, Dennis Township, Avalon. Stone Harbor, North Wildwood, West Wildwood and Wildwood Crest. Each of these sending districts has two things in dommon: One, they are paying less for the secondary education vOf their children; a fid two, they have no real say in how their children are being educated. ' The reason the taxpayere of a sending district are paying less — and why some such districts are tax haven/— is because sending districts pay a tuition to the-high school district. This per-student cos^ is based upon a formula established by the state Dept, of Education which does not include the debt service or maintenance

j^giutian broughl ibiwt hy Urn safe

• nimila aipreme Court in 1973. TAXPAYERS IN THE recemng

. kindergarten pupils

"We tried to see how two small districts could wOrk together *'without' consolidhtion,” principal Wendorf explained. "Because right now We don’t feel that ‘ f regionalization 1 is the way people would want to go Plus, teachers are apprehensive about it. So, we said, How con we ghare service* thftf wouldn't infringe upon anybody'll right*? And Avalon needed space, and Stone Harbor needed kids." Such cooperation-spurred-by-need is nothing new The Lower Township (elementary) School District provided the small West Cape May (elementary) School District with a hot lunch service in return tpr needed classroom space. In fact, the former superintendent of the township system once advocated regionalization of the elementary grades in the Greater Cape May-Lower Township area as a way of avoiding double sessions and shared ser vices and facilities in a neighboring district. *7 WHEN El) CAMPBELL beckme superintendent of the township elementary system several years ago, one of his first major achievements was to get a new elementary school built, the .Lower Township Memorial School in Villas It wis erected on land donated by the township adjacent to the municipal recrea tion center The timing was opportune and. through Campbell's adroitness, Lower Township municipal officials were convinced to share hundreds of thousands of dollars of federal Revenue Sharing funds for the construction of the new school, . which to this day is tied even physically to the municipality thru the sharing of the rec

center as the school gym

But even though that was only a few years ago. times are already different It is doubtful the federal government will be springing for any local education program or facility today And you would nqt lik<*ljP hear Republican Gov Kean even paraphrasing what his Democrat predecessor. Gov Brendan Byrne, said in' his State of the Union Message two years ago: “We have to^ake a hard look at con solidation, not only of services, but of small districts to develop efficiencies " Today, moat authorities on thb local and state level agree: There aren't going to be any.state-mandated regionalizations ONE AUTHORITY IS the man current]^ involved in the continuing private Utfks' which Greater Wildwood school district officials have been engaged in on a formal basis since last fall and, informally and individually, even before that. "No way is the state going to force regionalization.’’ says Roy Wager, a professional educational consultant who has worked with the state Dept, of Education

PRIOR TO THE COURT'Sy decision, districts — in most cases, hofne districts of districts entering into a regionalization the county's four public high schools - pay had. the choice of apportioning their cur- more than the taxpayers in the sending rent expense or debt service either by districts for two reasons. One, , they must .. ‘ ■ .■ i, a l 4: mnlrA itrt llwx sitffr>r-nnr> n in thn HnHl cnrvir'fx

pupil population or equalized valuation - the district paid only'to the basis of what percentage of studenra it sent to the

regional district.

"The (courts! decision said, No, you must pay your fair share, and you don't do this if you do it fry students. So, we had a five-year phase-in of pupil equalized valuation," consultant Wager explains. "What happens now is, if you have a rich

make up the difference in the debt service and maintenance costs not borne by the per pupil tuition from the sending districts; and, what is more, the taxpayers in the receiving districts are paying not on how many of their own students are attending the school, but on how much the system costs divided by the ability of the local taxpayers to pay — that is, on the

value of property — ratables.

“The point is they have no say in the education of their children 9

district and a low amount of students — no way do they want to come into a

regionalization.".

But one would think — as City Manager Coldren seems to be arguing — that taxpayment on a per-pupil basis would be the

most equitable way to go.

"But you see," replies Mr. Wager, "the Supreme Court said No. it isn't, because what you’re doing here is allowing a' district to pay only per pupil costs and not

what they’re able to pay."

The ability to pay is the key. That’s what the Supreme Court decision was based on ; and the subsequent T&E legislation that is

now the law of the state.

EXPLAINS WAGER: "See, before, it would be very nice for a very rich district to get into a regional. In other words, if you had a rich district arid a poor district and you went by pupil populatioo, you’re both paying the same price for the cost per kid.

Robert Bongart, the state Dept, of Education representative in Cape May County, says that the desire to have a voice in the education of their children is one of the factors behind the' regionalization study in the Wildwoods. Notes the county

school superintendent:

"We have only four high schools in the county (one district, Woodbine, buses their secondary students to Millville High School in Cumberland County) and we have 16 school districts. So, it’s obviotuT that a number of kids are going out of district to go to high school. At least Vith those districts who are sending their kids to Lower Cape May Regional, they have board members and they have a say in the affairs of that school. And that, I think, is one of the reasons why the people in the Crest and in North Wildwood had some feeling abouj investigating regionalization of some .kind. Because their kids go to

only the poor district is paying more total- . Wildwood High School already.”

ly - they .have less ability to raise that

nfoney."

The educational consultant notes there are currently a few bills in the legislative hopper to change the regionalization formula back to a pupil population basis. "We

MR. BONGART GOES so far as to com-

pare it to, in his words: "the old cliche —,

taxation without representation." According to the county school

superintendent, this is exactly what is happening currently in Wildwood and in the

don’t know hqw they’re going to do it," he- upper part of the county where Sea Isle Ci-

comments, adding that if it ever does cOme about, there'll be an inundaiion of attempts to regionalize by the ratable rich districts with few students. \ This'may very well be the dlase with most Jersey Cape resort island communities eventually if what some incounty educators perceive as a trend continues: That is, the exodus to the mainland's less expensive but newer housing by the island homeowner with schoolage children, who can sell his nearbeach property for hundreds of thousands

of dollars.

Acknowledges one local school ad-

ty and Upper Township students go to Ocean City High School on a tuition basis but have no board members. Emphasizes the county superintendent of schools: "I'm not saying that up there anybody’s particularly unhappy. I’m just saying it’s a

condition that docs exist.”

According to Superintendent Bongart, the initial discussion began around the same time he arrived in the county almost two years ago. When he heard there was interest in looking into regionalization, his advice was that instead of merely talking, they should initiate a formal study. "So the school boards involved passed

resolutions saying they would like to have the various modes of regionalization — K thru 12th, 7 thru 12, or 9 thru 121- Studied," Mr. Bongart rfaid. The results of. this overall study will be forthcoming to the local board of,education in a few weeks. THERE HAVE BEEN three or four meetings sinte last fall of the Advisory Committee studying regionalization. The committee consists of the chief school administrator of each school district, the president and vice, president or other representative of each of the four school boards, the county superintendent; and Mr^Wager.'the staler educational donsultant whdnr Bongart describes as the state's man in such talks. The impression, if not consensus, one gets from talking with some of those who are participating in the Advisory Committee meetings is the belief, among other outcomes, that the final study recommendation to the ’individual boards will be that they consider a kindergarten thru 12th grade concept. And that the talks leading up to this study report — which isn’t yet -completed — have been sessions marked by frankness. Those Advisory Committee, members cuitacted by the newspaper — some of wnom expressed an unwillingness to talk i prior to the study results being forwarded to the school boards -? displayed a sirailaiS candor when asked what it was they hoped their district would gain were regionalization to become a reality. . ( "THE THING WE WANT to gain is representation on the high school level,” explains Margaret Lewis, president of the Wildwood Crest Board of- Education. "Right now, we artf a sending district, that is we send our children to Wildwood High School and basically we pay what amounts to a tuition, but we have no say at all in the type of education that they receive at Wildwood High School." Noting how much tuition payments to Wildwood amount to (it’s over $557,000 in the new budget), Mrs. Lewis continued: "What we would gain by regionalization is we would then have members from Wildwood Crest on the new school board. This way, we would have some kind of say in the way our half-million dollars is being used." Dorothy Stingel, president of the West Wildwood Board of Education, agrees. "The other boards feel that they want to have something to say about the high school,” she commented. "You know — how it’s run, the curriculum and so forth. That’s what this whole thing’s about." WEST WILDWOOD DEPENDS upon the Wildwood School District for the education of its elementary schooUge children ns well as those attending high school. More . than $128,000 iS earmarked for tuition in the new budget, to pay the costs of educating an estimated 63 children from the tiny borough Educational consultant Wager agrees that it was the desire to gain a voice in the education of their children which brought about the look into possibly regionalizing. "I think the initial input was they wanted representation on the board of education for the education of the children. That was the initial input. At the secondary level, they had no input." Mr. Wager notes there are two factors which traditionally cause districts to look .into regionalization. declining enrollments and costs. "They're afraid of losing programs, especially at the secondary level. They’re afraid of starting to lose conb-ol of facilities where they may have fo start closing schools, and they're afraid they may have to lose good teachers," he explains. ’’ No. % is costs. Declining enrollments will start to affect costs because then it becomes more expensive per pupil cost. By joining together, they may be able to be more efficient in the use of their fa<nilty, their buildings, ancillary services." (Page 18 Please)