|
The Gilbert School — A Very Expensive Relic!
By Ray Pavlak, Winsted
Who is out of touch with reality—the Gilbert school board and trustees, or me? The board has approved a $286,000 increase in their budget, which will largely be absorbed by the taxpayers of Winsted. This sizable increase follows a generous budget that passed the town meeting and referendum last year. Gilbert's total budget last year was $4.8 million; now they propose a budget of $5.1 million for 2003-04.
Don't they know the financial condition of the nation, state and town? Don't they realize that most of the town's taxpayers are strapped? Do they talk to the working people who are out of work—or who, if employed, are stressed out as they do the work of two or more others who have been laid off? Do they hear merchants or even hairdressers who have seen their incomes fall, as customers are not buying or are waiting twice as long to have their hair cut or styled?
The taxpayer is further upset and angered when told that the increase is necessary in part to make up for the loss of 40 of the 80 students from Hartland who used to attend Gilbert. Why? Aren't there other ways for Gilbert to adjust to this change? One obvious way is to cut costs by downsizing the staff to meet the reduction in the number of pupils.
If the pupil level increased by 40, we would hear that there was a need for two or more new teachers. We have heard this and paid for it before. Isn't it reasonable, in this case, for the taxpayer to expect reductions in costs and staffing?
Sadly, our chickens have come home to roost. Five years ago, emotions overrode reason when the electors of Winsted decided to elect a pro-Gilbert town board of education. This pro-Gilbert interest group gave away the store to the Gilbert trustees. They signed a contract that said, in exchange for the privilege of sending its students to Gilbert School, the Town of Winchester would:
(1) give millions of taxpayer dollars to build an addition and remodel the school, which was in a sad condition because the trustees' endowment was at a drastically low level.
(2) give up the option of sending its students to other schools or building its own high school.
(3) give control of the operation of the school—which the taxpayers of Winsted paid to renovate—to a private board, elected not by the taxpayers but by the Gilbert trustees.
4. withdraw its court case for a declaratory judgment of what the legal obligations were between the town and Gilbert.
Now the town and its people are hostage to Gilbert's appointed school board. As David LaPointe, a representative (and a minority) on the Gilbert board from the Winsted board of education, has said: "I felt my hands were tied …"
Winsted has five more years left in its contract with Gilbert. Even when the contract runs out, the town will have no alternative, since the State of Connecticut will not reimburse the town to build a new school until 30 years have passed since it granted money for the last school.
What can you and I do? Our best immediate course is to discuss the situation at the town budget meeting, where reductions can be made, or to vote against the budget in the referendum to follow. We can't force Gilbert to reduce their budget, but morally they should!
| 
