Peru school directors were surprised by the vote.
DIXFIELD – Peru school directors watched two years of work toward merging with SAD 21 go down the tubes Monday night. It took less than 10 minutes.
Instead of agreeing to send a merger contract to Maine’s education commissioner and furthering the process, a majority of SAD 21 directors representing Dixfield and Carthage voted not to submit the agreement.
“It’s a shame,” said Peru school Director Richard Colpitts. “I was disappointed by the outcome of the vote. I thought we had a stronger relationship and trust with SAD 21 than what I saw tonight.”
Additionally, SAD 21’s board, which conducted a 90-minute workshop on the agreement prior to its regular meeting, further snubbed Peru’s school board members by not allowing a scheduled joint meeting to review the agreement.
“I wish we had been given the opportunity to dialogue further. Now, it’s highly unlikely that Peru voters will want to join SAD 21 in the absence of trust, a good relationship and dialogue,” Colpitts said.
After the vote, Peru school directors and Peru Superintendent John Turner left SAD 21’s regular board meeting and met in another room at the T.W. Kelly Dirigo Middle School in Dixfield.
“This is not going to go over good with Peru voters,” one director said. “They’re going to say, ‘If they don’t want us, who wants them?'”
Peru School Committee Chairwoman Tammi Lyons wanted to put the matter to Peru voters regardless of SAD 21’s apparent rejection of the agreement.
“We as a committee have done all we can do,” Lyons said. “This has to go to the commissioner. This has to go to the Peru people.”
Last month, in a joint meeting between SAD 21 and Peru school directors, Maine Education Commissioner Susan A. Gendron recommended that both boards agree to a cost-share ratio based 90 percent on valuation and 10 percent on pupil population.
Prior to that, SAD 21 stood firm on a ratio based 100 percent on valuation and that appeared to be the case at Monday night’s meeting as well, although directors were not immediately accessible after the vote to acknowledge that since they were continuing their regular meeting.
“I feel that if we have to go it at 100 percent, Peru is already paying more per child than (the SAD 21 towns of) Canton, Carthage and Dixfield. Do we want to pay even more?” Colpitts asked.
Peru directors “really felt that a merger with SAD 21 would be in the best interest of our children, but (at 100 percent valuation) we can’t afford it,” he added.
Colpitts and Turner then argued that SAD 21’s vote effectively negated the contract and it wouldn’t matter if Peru directors sent the document to the commissioner.
“We have no platform to stand on. They told us they don’t want us at 90-10. This is a horrible situation to get into because you don’t want to enter into a marriage that the other half doesn’t want,” Colpitts said.
Peru School directors also discussed options.
They ranged from going ahead with the merger process without SAD 21’s board, reopening merger negotiations with SAD 43, going it on their own, or pulling tuitioned secondary students out of SAD 21.
Peru, a kindergarten through eighth-grade school district, pays tuition to send most of its secondary students to SAD 21. Only a few attend SAD 43.
Turner said that if Peru opted not to pay tuition for its secondary students to SAD 21, it would result in an estimated loss of $700,000 to SAD 21.
“They would have to lose a few teachers if we pulled out,” Colpitts said.
Although one director thought Peru, which has an aging school with ever increasing problems, should go it alone and try to get a new school built, Colpitts said that would be a real tough sell with the state.
In the end, directors agreed to have Turner follow through with his meeting Wednesday with Gendron in Augusta, and give Peru voters the facts at a informational merger meeting set for Jan. 13.
That’s when they intend to circulate a survey of options available to Peru voters to get an anonymous straw vote about which direction to next pursue.
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