Why Vote No?
Well, it’s time! After all the talk, all the figures, all the truths and lies, all the innuendos, and so much, sadly, division cropping up once again between those two wonderful towns of Atlantic Highlands and Highlands, it’s time for a vote on the question of regionalization. Vote No.
The polls are open in the usual places in both towns, not early in the morning as for regular elections, but from noon to 8 p.m. In Highlands, districts will vote in both the fire house and the VFW post home as usual; in Atlantic Highlands, everyone will vote at the Charles Hesse building at St. Agnes School as usual.
It’s an important vote, since it will impact the education of students and the cost to taxpayers forever in the future. That’s why it is essential not only to cast a ballot, but to cast it with knowledge and understanding of all the questions around it. Vote No
If you do not know the answers to all of the questions, if you do not know the impact of a change, then it has to be a vote of NO in the polling booth Tuesday.
Why would you vote to change something if you don’t know what effect it will have?
If you think approving it means Sea Bright will become part of the school district, than a NO vote at the polls on Tuesday is essential. Voting for a change Tuesday DOES NOT mean Sea Bright will be included.
If you want to see Sea Bright bring in a few million dollars to help offset your taxes, then you have to vote NO in the polling booth Tuesday. This question being decided Tuesday DOES NOT include Sea Bright nor give any promise Sea Bright and its millions will ever be included.
Highlands votes, in particular. If you don’t want to see your town in the future being in the same predicament Sea Bright is in now….paying tens of thousands of dollars more than your neighboring town simply because you have fewer students in the schools. Then vote NO in the polling booth Tuesday.
Highlands voters, do you even know how much debt the Atlantic Highlands elementary school has now?
Do you know if you vote for change, that means you will then be shouldering HALF of their debt? Then vote NO at the polling booth Tuesday.
Right now, the schools in both towns are run under one superintendent. And the three school boards just voted a couple of months ago to keep the same superintendent in charge for at least the next three years. She gets upwards of $180,000 a year to do her job.
That will not change, no matter whether you vote aye or nay. But you might want to wonder whether she is doing a great job when you consider that at Henry Hudson alone, more than 35 employees, mostly teachers, have quit or retired. Unless you want to give her even more control, vote NO at the polls Tuesday.
It’s that superintendent who has been leading the charge to give an affirmative vote on Tuesday, a vote which will keep her taxes the same in her hometown of Oceanport. The lawyers are saying there is no conflict in her advocating voting now and excluding Sea Bright and keeping her own taxes stable in Oceanport is not a conflict.
She has never has promised to work or advocate letting Sea Bright in…now or in the future! So if you want to see Sea Bright come into the district with its millions of dollars, vote NO at the Polls on Tuesday. That leaves it open for voters to make the decision in the near future.
What will change is whether there will be three boards or one board. A yes vote will reduce it to one board overseeing all three schools. So it will save voters the cost of one secretary….two schools already share one.
What’s stopping all three from sharing the position now?
The schools already cost share on so much. Why can’t they share on so much more right now? It doesn’t take wiping out a couple of boards of education to agree to share costs.
Isn’t that something the superintendent should have been advocating, promoting and putting into effect all along? A NO vote at the polls Tuesday will give the three boards the opportunity look at the whole picture themselves and find other ways to cost share. It’s their tax dollars, not the superintendent’s.
A NO vote at the polls Tuesday will give every educator, every taxpayer, every parent, everyone interested in the education of our youth the opportunity to get the CORRECT and HONEST answer to all the questions before changing anything.
Change for the sake of change accomplishes nothing. A NO vote at the polls on Tuesday is essential if you want the time to learn more, to let the voters decide the future, to keep things stable until those experts who have all UNANIMOUSLY said Sea Bright should be part of Highlands and Atlantic Highlands schools are listened to and followed. A NO vote will give the public the opportunity to vote on listening to the experts…and doing it as soon as possible.
A NO vote at the polls on Tuesday keeps the opportunity alive to follow what all the experts say should happen as soon as possible, what the new state law was specifically created to do, namely enable regionalization with Sea Bright, and common sense to take effect.
Wow. Lying about Dr Beams? Lying about the impact this will have on the children. Of course they wanted Sea Brite included! It was the COMMISSIONER of education who said NO. Call and find out for yourself. If you were a real journalist who would have done some fact finding. You are a fraud
Please … let me know what you believe was a lie about Tara Beams?
Peter. If you noticed, this was an opinion piece not a straight news story. Talk about education. BTW the State Commissioner did NOT say no to Sea Bright…that IS a fact
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