KINGFIELD – A day after the Jay School Department voted to submit a consolidation plan to the Department of Education, school board directors to the north were mulling a reorganization plan for their own districts.
MSAD 58 and MSAD 74 continued looking at an Alternative Organization Structure proposal Tuesday evening, which would effectively combine some of the districts’ central office functions with an eye toward future savings. An AOS would be governed by a group of directors from both districts, which would approve and oversee a budget for a single central office. The plan includes some of the most accessible savings of full consolidation, upper-level administrative functions such as superintendents, directors of transportation, special education and payroll, without losing signficant local control.
It would also satisfy the state consolidation law, equating to roughly $280,000 in subsidy that would be withheld by the noncompliance penalty.
Some MSAD 58 directors expressed concerns with the process, given the uncertainty of both the change-over in Augusta, which will impact the DOE, as well as their own ongoing assessment of their districts’ future. MSAD 58 learned at its last board meeting that an AOS would not allow it to be considered a Somerset County district, which would have resulted in increased state subsidies due to that region’s more-favorable labor market statistic.
This reduces immediate savings to a combination of whatever positions can be combined in the AOS, as well as the retention of the non-compliance penalty funds. MSAD 58 Superintendent Quenten Clark thought that the $700,000 worth of shared position salaries could be reduced somewhat, although short-term savings might be lessened by the need to bring on assistants to cover larger workloads. For example, the AOS would only have a single superintendent position, but that might require the addition of an assistant superintendent to cover the duties that had previously been entrusted to two people.
Director Alan Morse, of Phillips, said he saw the AOS as a trade-off of some local control for some savings.
“I want to make sure we’re not just doing this as a publicity stunt,” Morse said of the AOS, noting that the labor market issue represented a loss in incentive for his district.
Other directors countered that the AOS offered opportunities for the sharing of ideas as well as funds.
“I hope there’ll be benefits for both the students and faculty,” Chair Judy Dill said.
Director Gerald “Mike” Pond, of Strong, pointed to the ongoing discussions regarding the future of MSAD 58’s own facilities as a possible issue, as reductions in some areas could result in changes at central office. Pond suggested that closing a school, as an example, could result in a part-time superintendent.
“I think this is a no-brainer,” Director Sue Fotter, of Eustis, said.
“I would certainly hope that the MSAD 58 board would make up its mind,” Clark said at one point.
Eventually, the entire committee agreed to let the superintendents develop plans to be presented on Nov. 30. MSAD 74 Superintendent Kenneth Coville had already prepared some of the more boiler-plate aspects of the AOS plan for the committee’s consideration.
The districts would maintain control of their own teacher contracts, their facilities, their assets and their individual budgets. However, a number of directors from each board would serve on an AOS committee that would meet to set a budget for whatever positions the AOS encompassed; some initial positions that have been considered include the superintendent, the director of transportation, the staff involved with payroll and accounts payable, as well as some supporting secretarial positions.
Other positions could be shared through an eventual expansion of the AOS, or through inter-district agreements. The special education director for MSAD 58 currently works at MSAD 74, for example, through such an agreement.
After the AOS committee approved a budget for the central office, that budget would need to be approved by each district’s own board, as part of their separate, annual budgets. How those costs are broken down between the two districts remains to be decided, although both superintendents said they believed MSAD 58 and MSAD 74’s similar sizes and valuations would work in the favor of an equitable system.
The Regional Planning Committee is hoping to have a plan ready for voter consideration by early February. Timing is an issue as, if approved, the AOS committee would need to work swiftly to prepare the central office budget in time for the distrists’ usual budget process.
