Primary Learning Center, Laurelton to close
State cap, less state aid, falling enrollment to blame, officials say
BY PATRICIA A. MILLER Staff Writer
If he had his druthers, Brick Township Superintendent of Schools Melindo A. Persi would have picked "Option A" to deal with a $3,515,650 budget shortfall for the 2008-09 school year.

PATRICIA A. MILLER The Laurelton School on Route 88 East and the Brick Primary Learning Center on Chambers Bridge Road are slated to close because of a school budget shortfall. The Laurelton School, built in 1934, is the oldest operating school in the district. Students from Laurelton will be moved to the PLC. Preschool and kindergartners will attend school in their respective neighborhoods next fall.

That plan called for closing the Osbornville, Herbertsville and Laurelton schools and using $37,681 more from the district's surplus account.

But Persi knew even before he gave a presentation at the Feb. 12 Board of Education meeting that the plan wouldn't work. He and other district school administrators had spent a frenzied nine days crunching numbers to come up with a solution to the shortfall.

Board of Education members gave him an answer at the end of a marathon, nearly four-hour meeting in the Brick Township High School auditorium on Feb. 12.

They voted 5-2 to go with "Option B," which called for the closing of the district's Primary Learning Center (PLC) on Chambers Bridge Road and the Laurelton School off Route 88 and using an additional $4,082,937 from the district's surplus account. That plan would shave $1,964,237 off the shortfall. Board members Daniel Woska and Virginia Reinhold voted no.

"The best recommendation is Option A," Persi said. "I don't think the community was ready for that and the board wasn't ready for it. The community said loud and clear, look at the PLC.We looked at it. It worked."

Residents with homes assessed at the township average will pay another $110 a year, based on the tentative, roughly $140million budget school officials submitted to county School Superintendent Bruce Greenfield on Feb. 15.

Residents packed the Feb. 6 meeting at Veterans Memorial Middle School to oppose any plans to close the Osbornville and Herbertsville schools. Board members listened to 58 suggestions fromthe public about howto close the money gap. Closing the Primary Learning Center was one of them.

Persi expects to have a budget summary ready for the public to viewsometime this week. But based on the preliminary numbers, residents with a home assessed at the township average of $130,000 can expect to pay an additional $110 a year. The school tax rate is expected to rise 10.8 cents for each $100 of assessed valuation, he said.

School officials and board members have been grappling with a state-imposed 4-percent budget cap on expenditures, declining state aid and declining enrollment.

All of the four options Persi presented to the board and the audience on Feb. 12 contained predetermined cuts. They included the elimination of $494,400 in newpositions, including an additional assistant superintendent; the elimination of four special education teachers and six paraprofessionals at $403,450; $71,358 for assistant sports coaches; $45,000 in special police costs; and $24,000 in cuts for graduation caps and gowns for high school seniors

The roughly 50 middle and high school special needs students who now attend Laureltonwill go to the Primary Learning Center next fall. The Laurelton School will be put up for sale.

"We want to get an appraiser in there and take a look at it," Persi said. "Basically, I think the property isworth a lot more than the building."

All of the preschool and kindergarten students who would have gone to the Primary Learning Center will now go to elementary schools closest to their homes.

Persi outlined the four options before the meeting was opened up to the public.

"We're getting dumped on by the state," he said after the meeting. "We have had flat funding for five years. And they [state officials] had the audacity to give us $700,000 more. They should have kept it."

Oneman questioned howdistrict officials could close the Primary Learning Center, which has been considered a model school throughout the state. He noted that Lucille Davy, the state commissioner of education, had praised the center during a visit last year.

"Now you want to shut it down," he said. Board President CynthiaMcCarthy said that Davy came to the district just to shore up her image.

"She has a very bad public image and she used our school," McCarthy said. McCarthy also placed blamed Davy for the "lousy funding formula."

"She has lied to the people of Brick Township," McCarthy said. "I'm very upset about the funding formula. It's very unfair."

Roughly 81 percent of the district's budget goes to salaries and pension costs, Persi said.

Resident P.J. Scelfo asked why volunteers couldn't offer to help coach school teams.

State law requires that school coaches have a minimum of 60 college credits to be eligible,McCarthy said.

"If Don Mattingly wanted to coach our baseball team and didn't have college credits, he couldn't," board member Allen Atheras said.

Things aren't going to get any better next year, Persi said.

"We have to pay salaries," he said. "We will be in the same box again. Our enrollment will be down about 250 students. We had schools that were operating that we don't really need. But nobody is going to accept that at this time."

"It's not going to go away," Persi added. "The enrollment is declining. Anytime we make any changes, people are upset.We have to deal with the declining enrollment."