Region 12 Needs Approval to Close Local Schools

05/05/2007

Bridgewater Board Will Seek Okay to Ask School Board to Amend Education Plan

By: John Addyman


BRIDGEWATER - At Tuesday night's town hearing, the Board of Selectmen will seek approval to make a formal request to the Region 12 school board to amend the educational plan of the district to allow for a consolidated school, rather than the three-town-school set that now exists.
That request would force referenda in all three towns and if one or more towns decide against a consolidated school, the issue may be dead.
Region 12 already has a referendum planned for June 19 to bond a consolidated-school project; Bridgewater's selectmen argue that neither the project nor the referendum can move forward without the region's educational plan first being amended to allow for a consolidated school.
"What we're doing, according to the statutes of the state of Connecticut, is requesting that the educational plan be amended," said First Selectman Bill Stuart.
"A legislative body has to request that the Board of Education to amend its plan and that's what we plan to do.
"The region wants to put a consolidated vote up. We believe, before they can put that vote up, they must amend the plan - with referenda in each town. They're going to tell you they don't have to do that. That doesn't make any difference to us; the statute says when a town's legislative body requests an amendment to the plan, 'the school district shall file a report with the state board of education and have a referendum.'
"The school board has to have an approval in each town to proceed. If they don't have each town's concurrence, they can't change the plan."
Mr. Stuart said the Atwood et al case from 1975 ruled that minutes of meetings that led to the formation of the region also constitute the educational plan.
"What was filed with the state is the regional plan and the school district is bound by it. Also, we have in our possession a document filed with the state board of education in 1967 that states right out that the three schools stay in their towns."