FORT KENT, Maine — The lakeside town of Winterville is one step closer to splitting from SAD 27 and taking roughly $150,000 in local tax revenue with it following Tuesday night’s school board vote.
The 7-1 vote approving the withdrawal means Winterville residents will hold a referendum on withdrawing from the district and, if passed, send it on to the Maine commissioner of education for approval, something SAD 27 officials see happening by the start of the new year.
“We are fairly certain as of Jan. 1 the students from Winterville will no longer be part of SAD 27,” Tim Doak, district superintendent, said Wednesday. “Those students will be tuitioned here.”
Winterville is about 22 miles south of Fort Kent.
While Winterville will pay $10,200 tuition for each of the seven high school students and $7,300 for each of the 20 elementary students attending classes in Fort Kent, that will not make up the entire $389,000 the town contributes to the district annually, Doak said.
Based on current enrollment numbers, SAD 27 would take in around $217,000 in tuition money from Winterville, according to Lucie Tabor, district director of finance and projects.
“With what we anticipate collecting from the town to transport the students plus a bit more for items not included in the tuition like specific special education services, I anticipate the total collected would be $236,000,” she said Wednesday afternoon. “But that is very basic and could change if the number of students goes up or down.”
Tabor noted those tuition rates, which are set by the state annually, fluctuate from year to year.
For the last fiscal year, Winterville taxpayers contributed $13,809 in local funds per pupil attending school in SAD 27, according to figures supplied by the district’s financial office. Elsewhere in SAD 27, the local cost per student is $7,698 in Eagle Lake, $6,045 in St. Francis, $5,326 in Wallagrass, $5,314 in New Canada, $4,438 in St. John Plantation and $3,782 in Fort Kent.
Winterville Plantation is assessed a high state valuation because most of it is on the shores of St. Froid Lake. That waterfront property, while scenic, means the town receives no state funding for education, according to John Martin, SAD 27 board member representing Winterville.
Should Winterville withdraw, Doak said, it is inevitable some costs would shift to other member towns.
“It’s a bit early to say what we are going to do with the budget if Winterville is successful in withdrawing,” Doak said. “We will have a better idea when we start building our budget in January or February [but] taking Winterville out of the formula is not going to help.”
On Tuesday, the SAD 27 board also gave the go-ahead to a group of St. Francis parents to pursue grants on behalf of the district aimed at keeping the St. Francis Elementary School open.
Earlier this year the board had discussed closing the smallest of the district’s four elementary schools and busing its 36 pre-kindergarten to grade five students to Fort Kent as a cost-saving measure.
In August the school narrowly avoided a board vote to close it down in the wake of a $1.7 million anticipated shortfall in the 2014-2015 fiscal year budget.
At the time, Doak said closing the St. Francis Elementary School could save the district up to $223,000, based on calculations by the Maine Department of Education.
Instead, board members in August agreed to give a committee of St. Francis parents and residents until Jan. 8 to come up with a plan or plans to cut costs and bring in additional revenue at the school.
“If they can write the grants at no cost to [the district] in money or manpower, they are free to do so,” Doak said.
The full board will consider the committee’s findings when it revisits the issue of closing the school at its Jan. 19 meeting.
