Botelle parents protest flatfunding of school

By Wiley Wood
Photos by Bruce Frisch

A large crowd of about 75 Norfolk residents gathered for the annual town meeting on May 13 in the Hall of Flags at Botelle School. Although normally a humdrum gathering at which the budget is passed with little comment, there has been more tension than usual this year between the Board of Finance, which has wanted to hold the line on spending in response to a steep decrease in property values that will force the tax rate to jump about 14 percent, and the Board of Education, whose budget has been cut every year for the past five years.

At the annual budget hearing on April 22, the Board of Finance proposed to cut the Board of Education’s request for Botelle School by $26,000. Superintendent Mary Beth Iacobelli pleaded strongly for more funding. Five years ago, the school’s allocation was $70,000 higher. The cost of living, she pointed out, has meanwhile gone up, as have teachers’ salaries and benefits. And while the school had lost 20 to 25 students in that time, special education costs had risen $100,000 in the last two years. If the Board of Finance’s proposed decrease in funding went through, said Iacobelli, drastic changes in programming at Botelle would result.

The Board of Finance heard and responded to this plea in the course of its next special meeting on April 30, to the extent of restoring $10,000 to the Board of Education budget. This brought school funding for the coming year to $2,490,000, the same level as last year, once a state-ordered addition of $35,000 is factored in. But it was still $16,000 short of the Board of Education’s request.

But the news that the Board of Finance had ended its string of yearly cuts to Botelle was lost in the uproar that attended that meeting. A large contingent of Botelle parents had arrived at Town Hall on that weekday evening to have their say. But Chairman Michael Sconyers, after characterizing the school budget as “not frugal” and saying, “It just seems that the Board of Ed should be able to handle a less than 1 percent reduction,” informed the parents that there was no provision in the agenda for public comment. The finance board passed the budget unanimously, the meeting was adjourned, and Sconyers and most of the board members walked out, to the jeers and taunts of the angry supporters of Botelle. Three of the board members—Nina Ritson, Karen Sebach, and Grant Mudge—stayed to talk.

The question on many minds as residents gathered for the May 13 town meeting was whether the parents and supporters of Botelle School would vote against the proposed budget, and whether they had sufficient votes to stop its passage. A no vote on the budget would send the Board of Finance back to the drawing board and cause a new budget to be presented at a later town meeting.

In the event, the parents proved more placating. A letter written by Ann DeCerbo, the president of the Parent Teachers Organization and a member of the Board of Education, urged those in attendance to vote for the proposed budget and reassured parents that the art and music programs would be in place for next year. A second parent, John DeShazo, argued that a thriving school isimportant to the community and said that a flat budget year after year is effectively a cut. A third, John Bennett, described how he had moved to Norfolk with his wife and children four years ago, drawn in part by Botelle’s robust language and arts programs, only to see them dropped. Calculating the monthly cost to an average Norfolk household to restore the school’s language and strings programs, he said, “These are really small numbers for very big returns—less than a Netflix subscription.”

The budget, as proposed by the Board of Finance, passed unanimously. It calls for $3.5 million in spending for general government, including a 2.5 percent increase in the long-frozen salaries of Town Hall workers and a $6,000 pay increase for the first selectman. The Regional # 7 School District will receive $1.93 million from Norfolk, an increase of $200,000, largely due to the greater number of Norfolk students attending Regional next year. And Botelle School will get its $2.49 million.

Although these expenditures call for an actual decrease of 2.7 percent in the amount of taxes to be raised—largely due to a one-time cash infusion from the town’s rainy day fund—the mill rate will rise 14.45 percent in the coming year, to 26.98. At the May 14 Board of Finance meeting where next year’s tax rate was officially set, the town auditor, George Sinnamon, commended the Board of Finance for the town’s sensible financial controls and applauded both the Selectmen’s Office and the Board of Education for “very good transparency” in their budgets.

Photo, top: John and Amy Bennett, Botelle parents, speak out at the May 13 town meeting in favor of an expanded school budget.