At Thursday’s meeting, the Atlantic Highlands Borough Council read and unanimously passed their resolution authorizing borough officials to meet with representatives of Highlands and a Mediator to work on the formula to be used between the two boroughs for sharing annual tax savings generated by the regionalization of the school districts. Tracey Abby White, present at the meeting along with dozens of residents from the three boroughs affected, issued the following statement . Abby-White was formally appointed by Mayor Loretta Gluckstein to head the committee to study regionalization of the schools last year and has been an outspoken spokesman in favor of regionalizing with Sea Bright
Last night’s vote was taken with Councilman James Murphy recusing himself because of any possible conflict inasmuch as his wife, Molly is a member and current president of the Atlantic Highlands Board of Education. Mayor Gluckstein under this form of government, only votes in case of tie votes.
The resolution, while excluding Sea Bright in the present mediation, indicates they might want to consider expanding a two town regionalization to three and include Sea Bright some time in the future.
During the public portion that followed the vote, Abby-White, noting frustration over the issue at previous meetings was her reason for reading her statement rather than presenting it without notes, cited past history of council resolutions.
Studies
On Dec 19, 2018, she said, Council passed resolution 184-2018 authorizing a shared feasibility study for educational shared services between Atlantic Highlands and Sea Bright for $20,000.
She pointed out that the study cited reasons that including Sea Bright made sense. The study was revised three years later and came back with the same conclusions, she said.
Four months after that, on April 21, 2021, the Board of Education got a $65,000 grant to do its own study of the same question. Last summer, during a public meeting, that study, the Kean study validated and endorsed the multiple benefits of including Sea Bright. The quote in that study was, “The sooner you do this, the more benefits you will receive.”
“The experts, hired by the Bord of Education and Council and paid for by our tax dollars, have been consistent in their findings. “ Abby-White said last night, “Why are we hiring professionals if we are not going to listen to them?”
Benefits
Abby-White, a former councilwoman as well as on the Board at Brookdale Community College, also told the governing body “The letter on the Tri-District website penned by the current superintendent agrees that including Sea Bright makes sense.” She quoted from that letter, ” eventually if ..Sea Bright joins the new regional district we reap the potential tax savings and educational benefits that their membership may bring”.
Yet More Lawyers
Abby-White continued “The Commissioner of Education can only respond to our proposal with the cost-sharing information, so we hired a professional, an attorney, to help. That did not work. So tonight, we are hiring another professional to mediate a mutually acceptable cost-sharing agreement. I hope this works.
Abby-White told the Mayor and Council and the crowded borough hall meeting room “Without Sea Bright, we are doing our students and community members a huge disservice. President Biden quoted his wife, Jill, during the State of the Union. She has an expression: “Any nation that out-educates us will out-compete us.” The studies we paid for stated that the best decision to improve our educational offerings was to include Sea Bright. The professionals we hired said it is best to include Sea Bright.
She concluded by pleading with the elected officials to “follow the advice of the professionals you hired, and we are paying for. Include Sea Bright and get it on the ballot during the regular election. “
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