DIXFIELD – Neighboring SADs 21 and 43 are waiting to learn whether SAD 39 will partner with them or with SAD 17 in Paris.

In the meantime, the Reorganizational Planning Committee overwhelmingly voted Wednesday night to submit a potential administrative merger plan without approval from the SAD 39 board to the state’s Department of Education.

“We’ll give the SAD 39 board time to meet with SAD 17 representatives to look at an organizational structure with them,” SAD 21 Superintendent Tom Ward said Thursday afternoon.

He said Department of Education Commissioner Susan Gendron has approved submission of the plan without SAD 39’s approval.

The possible new configuration has also required that a referendum vote, originally scheduled for Sept. 9, be postponed until the the general election on Nov. 4, said Ward.

He said public hearings on the possible merger will be conducted in the fall.

The SAD 39 board has scheduled a meeting for July 2, but Ward said it is doubtful whether the matter of a potential partner will be on the agenda.

SAD 39 Superintendent Rick Colpitts could not be reached for comment.

If SADs 21 and 43 eventually become administrative partners, Ward said the cost sharing figures should be about the same as they would be with SAD 39 figured in. A representative from the Portland law firm of Drummond Woodsum & MacMahon presented new figures that eliminate SAD 39 late Wednesday.

However, said Ward, he and SAD 43 Superintendent Jim Hodgkin had not yet had a chance to thoroughly review them.

Hodgkin could not be reached Thursday.

A meeting of SADs 21, 43 and the unaffiliated town of Hanover will be called once additional information is received from SAD 39. Ward said the latest figures can be available is mid-September, although he expects to have more information prior to that date.

“We’ll use the same model as with SAD 39,” he said.

That includes such things as sharing administrators and creating one governing board to operate merged districts. Individual schools, however, are not expected to be closed as a result of such mergers.

The potential merger is a result of a state law that mandates statewide consolidation of school units that aims to increase efficiency and educational offerings.