Charter Commission Update

The Charter Commission had its third meeting last night.

I'll be honest, it's hard for me to talk about all of this objectively. I have strong opinions about some of the things that were brought up last night, but I recognize that it won't help the process to dissect the discussions from last night here. 

So with that in mind, here's a quick recap of last night's meeting:

We had a presentation from Don Jutton, who talked about combining resources between the school and the town and regionalization. And then we heard from Tom Mahon, the chairman of the charter commission in Merrimack, and his experiences with the process. We discussed the challenges and opportunities facing Newmarket and the changing demographics of our Town.

When we meet again on July 8th, we'll first hear public comment. And then, I'm guessing that we will need to start making some decisions and decide on a direction. 

Based on the conversation last night, I think we'll be looking at 3 different options: A Board of Selectmen style of government, a City form of government with a strong Town Manager and a dependent school district, and a reworking of what we currently have. 

It's important that we hear from the public - not just about what form of government they would prefer, but also what residents see as our biggest challenges and our greatest opportunities. 

Whatever the Charter commission ends up doing, it will eventually take the support of the residents of Newmarket to approve it.

Where do you want to see Newmarket in 20 years?

Weighing in now will help shape the process.

The Rabbit Hole

"There's a difference between due diligence and dragging our heels. And I feel like we're doing the latter, not the former." - Councilor Nazzaro after a presentation on the proposed zoning changes to the M2 district at last night's Town Council meeting. 

I agree.

I'll be the first person to say that we should be cautious with any development that will increase the burden to services in Town (a point I did bring up at another hearing on this issue earlier this year), but this zoning change seems to have the least possible impact with the greatest possible revenue.

I hope Mr. Levy's questions get answered quickly and the Council can vote on this important issue. 

Overcrowded

I haven't watched the meeting yet, and I'm not opposed to development in Newmarket, but shouldn't we have a plan for our schools before we add a potential for 20 more students to our system? 

That's what the proposed development for the golf course property presented at last night's Planning Board meeting would bring to Newmarket. 

According to an article posted on Seacoastonline this afternoon, "Chinburg (the developer) pointed to a study that said an average home of the size proposed added 0.4 students to the school system per home."

Public Comment

The Charter Commission met last night and had it's first opportunity to hear from the community. 

Four people spoke. 

One of the things I've heard from people recently is that they felt it was too soon in the process to really know anything about the Charter. They want to hear more about what the Charter Commission wants to do before they comment. And the Charter Commission would like to get some direction from the residents of Newmarket before it sets off in a direction the public doesn't support. Maybe the next couple meetings will help us meet in the middle. 

I also think it's important to note that this isn't a test on each citizen's knowledge of the Charter. People have said that they don't feel like they know enough to have an opinion, but this is your government and your town, so you already know plenty. I think we just need to break it down into some broader questions. 

Here are a few that come to mind: 

• Do you like the structure of our government (consider the Town Council, Budget Committee, SB2)? 
• Do you like the Deliberative session? 
• How do you feel about voter participation? 
• If you didn't grow up in Newmarket, what was the form of government in your hometown and what did you like/not like about that? 
• Do you feel like your opinions are represented on the Council and other boards in Town? 

At our next meeting on June 24th, the Commission will be identifying and discussing the major opportunities and issues we see facing the Town now and in the next 10-15 years. What do you think? 

There are 3 more scheduled opportunities for people to provide public input--July 8, August 12 and September 9. 

Filling in the blanks.

The School Board met last week to begin the process of developing a Middle School only budget. 

This is a necessary exercise in order for the community to have an understanding of all the costs associated with a long term tuition agreement with the Oyster River School District. There are a lot of moving parts and the Middle School budget is only one piece that will require multiple decisions based on hypothetical situations. A daunting task. 

The School Board needs to fill in a lot of blanks for Newmarket residents. This is what they are looking at:

A tuition agreement with ORSD isn't just a matter of signing on the dotted line - never mind the fact that both Oyster River and Newmarket need to VOTE to do this. The issues in our district are complex and one thing often hinges on another and the School Board is tasked with looking at the big picture. 

First, the School Board must determine the Middle School configuration and then develop a facility plan based on that configuration. This was something the School Board seemed hesitant to delve too deeply into at the meeting. School Board members expressed the need for citizen input, something that will hopefully happen at Thursday's meeting and then they may feel more empowered to start making some decisions. 

Next, they will need to get into the meat of the budget. Of course, this will all be for naught if somewhere along the way, the tuition agreement with Oyster River doesn't happen. But at some point in the near future, they will have to start talking about what programs will be offered and how they will be implemented while taking a hard look at the bottom line---just like any other budget cycle.

In the meantime, I think there are a couple important things to point out. 

First: what does this mean to the teaching staff? There's been a lot of talk about teachers losing their jobs, and here are some preliminary numbers. 

Here is a snapshot of the staffing reductions:

A total reduction of 37.1 positions. 

The reduction in staffing represents a savings of approximately $2.18 million. (A word of caution---I use the term "savings" pretty loosely here. This is one piece of the puzzle and we still need a lot of other numbers. Don't plan on your tax bill going down.)

The second question I have is how will this affect programming? This was discussed at different points during the meeting, but I would like to see a program analysis in one place. While Math, Science, English and Social Studies staffing seemed consistent for the 6,7 & 8th graders, some other programs may be altered. 

One program change that was pointed out: currently Jr. High students have access to both Spanish and French. In this proposed budget, only Spanish would be available. However, now some Spanish would also be available to 5th graders, something which isn't currently being offered at the Elementary School. The School Board and the community will need to weigh the pros and cons of these types of changes.

Here's a snapshot of some of those proposed staffing changes:

I think this is all the tip of the iceberg and there is no doubt that the School Board will need to dig much deeper into these numbers in the coming weeks. 

There are many unanswered questions about how this will affect our district and I urge everyone interested to attend tomorrow's School Board meeting and start asking!

Meanwhile, at the State House....

It's been busy in Concord lately. Here are a few recent bills:

• The tax on tobacco (HB 659) was passed by the House in March, but killed by the Senate. Reps. Michael Cahill, Patricia Lovejoy and Marcia Moody voted for the tax and Rep. Adam Schroadter voted against.

• The Senate voted NOT to reinstate a minimum wage. (HB 501) Reps. Michael Cahill, Patricia Lovejoy and Marcia Moody supported a State minimum wage. Rep. Adam Schroadter did not. 

• SB 100, a bill that would allow employers to stop issuing paper paychecks, was killed by the House. 

• The legislature did not pass gambling. SB 152 was voted down by the House 199-164.

• HB 573, a bill that would allow the use of medical marijuana, passed the House in March and was amended by the Senate. Now it goes back to the House. All Newmarket Representatives voted in favor of this bill.

Discriminating

Really? Age discrimination? 

When RoseAnn Kwaks' letter to the editor first appeared in the paper, I joked to a friend that this is an example of those members of the Budget Committee who voted against her being too careful. Instead of pointing out the many concerns that people have with her representing our community, they used language like "fresh look" and "a different constituency...the younger part of Newmarket." 

There wouldn't be the potential for lawsuits right now if they had just pointed out that she has historically been unsupportive of the teachers and schools in Newmarket. But there was no mention of those concerns during the Budget committee's discussion of the candidates.

In an article on Friday's Seacoastonline, RoseAnn said "When they were saying youth, it was code for a certain agenda. A pro-school agenda."

Well, I guess she said it herself--it's not really about her age. It is about the fact that people disagree with her stance on funding education in Newmarket. 

Our community can't move forward unless people can balance both the desire to keep taxes low and our infrastructure needs and we need to elect people to boards and committees who represent that balance.