The School Board held their monthly business meeting on November 8, 2022 at the same time last-minute voters headed to the polls to determine the fate of the proposed $116 million School Bond for two new schools.  Not knowing that the bond would ultimately fail with a vote of 3,817 against and 2,337 in favor, Superintendent Chris Record acknowledged the significance of having reached this point in the New Schools Building Project regardless of the outcome:

This has been in the works since the early 1990s to build a new middle school.  A decision was made then not to do that and instead to renovate, and it was made with good intentions at the time, but that has led us to where we are now.  I’m excited that we got here; I trust the process; I think we will hear from the voters; and we will move on to what is next. I think no matter what, there will be some disappointed voters and we will have to work through it together as a community.

Record said that the Building Oversight Committee will be meeting on November 15 at 6:00 p.m., regardless of the election outcome.  In addition, there will be a School Board workshop on the November 16 at 5:45 p.m. to assess next steps.  Directly following this workshop, the School Board and Town Council will hold a joint workshop at 7:00 p.m. to, “Work together and collaborate,” Record said.  

School Board member Cynthia Voltz expressed gratitude to the community and volunteers who welcomed board members into their homes, “Invited their neighbors and really facilitated getting accurate information to them.  The engagement and interest in the community has been wonderful, and we very much appreciate it.”

Vice Chair Heather Altenburg echoed Voltz and Record and added, “I’ve spent a lot of time talking to a lot of people in the past few weeks; there are a lot of difference of opinions, but in the end, we are all neighbors and I hope that we can move forward together.”  In the event the bond would not pass, Altenburg said, “If this does not pass, then we will go to work to find some other variation or revision; at the very least, we are at very different place than we were last September.  The community is very aware of what is going on and I encourage people to stay informed; tonight is not the end, regardless of which way the vote turns out.”