JAY – Selectmen and Budget Committee members put a nearly $26,000 recommendation on a citizen-initiated article to reinstate the school bakery.

More than 200 people signed a petition asking selectmen to hold a special town meeting to transfer money to reinstate the bakery and personnel who lost jobs or received shortened hours after the School Committee voted to eliminate the bakery effective Jan. 1.

School Committee members in 3-2 vote approved Superintendent Robert Wall’s recommendation to eliminate the bakery in an effort to avoid a deficit in the program at the end of the year.

Petitioners had recommended $50,000 be transferred from the town’s undesignated fund to the Food Service Program.

Selectmen set the special town meeting for Wednesday, Jan. 21.

Selectmen’s Chairman Bill Harlow had asked Wall to bring back some figures to determine how much was needed for the bakery to be reinstated for the remainder of the school year.

Wall gave a letter to selectmen stating that the estimate for the augmentation amount requested in connection with the upcoming special town meeting is $25,965.80.

That is factored at $305.48 per day for 85 days.

That amount covers the labor costs related to reopening of the bakery for the remainder of the 2003-04 year only, Wall wrote.

It also covers restoration of hours for food service employees for the remainder of the school year.

“This estimate is not a commitment by the School Department to the restoration of the food service program to the original complement,” Wall wrote. “Should a positive vote take place on Jan. 21, the School Committee has the option to consider the implications. A vote of the Jay School Committee would then be necessary for any modification/augmentation of the present program to take place.”

If the article was approved, Wall said, the School Committee would take it up on Feb. 5.

If the board agrees with the proposal, Wall said, the changes would most likely be implemented Feb. 9.

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