Board of Ed looks to give away Millerton Elementary

WEBUTUCK — The wheels have begun turning for the North East Central School District (commonly known as Webutuck) Board of Education (BOE). Its members are thinking about donating the Millerton Elementary School building to a worthy recipient just as it gave, for $1, the former Amenia Elementary School building to the town of Amenia last year.The BOE passed a resolution on March 28 to ask voters to approve a referendum designating the Millerton Elementary School building surplus; it has not been in use since last year. That would allow the board to sell or give away the building for less than market value. The overall plan is to complete Webutuck’s transition to one centralized campus on Haight Road, a result of the decreases in student enrollment in the district. Centralizing the schools’ operations is expected to save the district money and allow it to more effectively use its resources.Unlike the transfer of the Amenia Elementary School building, which took place over two years, a designated recipient of the Millerton building has not been expressly identified. Town Supervisor Wayne Euvrard, was vocal early on in that process about the town’s intention to use the building as a permanent Town Hall. District voters gave permission to the school district to sell the building to the town of Amenia at its budget vote in 2009; the new Town Hall opened after several delays in late 2010.BOE President Dale Culver mentioned the village of Millerton, the town of North East, the North East Community Center and the American Legion Post 178 have all shown interest in the Millerton building. The proposed authorization allowing the donation of the Millerton building leaves the intended recipient blank for the board’s future approval, but both the village and town are listed by name as candidates.The March 28 meeting was the last meeting at which the board could authorize propositions to be placed on this year’s ballot. The vote will be held on May 17 and will include referendums on the budget, the purchase of two 65-passenger school buses and declaring the Millerton Elementary School building as surplus. A final proposal asks voters to allow the transfer of funds currently reserved specifically to purchase a new bus garage for the district into a Bus Purchase Reserve fund that was also created at the March 28 meeting.Culver explained that the district is not in need of a new bus garage at this time and that the remaining funds in that line (about $300,000) could be used to finance the cost of purchasing school buses and vehicles during the next 10 years.The maximum sum that could be collected in that reserve fund throughout the course of the 10 years would be $2 million. The reserve could be funded through transportation aid coming from the state, any portion of the non-allocated fund balance as determined by the board or any other amount authorized by district voters.A separate authorization also passed by the board that night would allow the board to spend monies in that reserve for the purchase of buses, but stipulated that the maximum cost of each bus would be $220,000.The reserve will commence with the 2011-12 school year, which begins July 1.