District officials have not decided whether the referendum will be for a new school or for additions to existing schools
Lea Kahn
Township residents likely will be asked to vote on a bond referendum next spring, regardless of whether Washington Township continues to send its high school students to Lawrence High School after its sending/receiving agreement expires in 2005.
The township schools face overcrowding in the classrooms at Lawrence High School, Lawrence Middle School and Lawrence Intermediate School, school district officials told a crowd of about two dozen people at a special school board meeting last week.
The March 16 meeting was called to discuss the financial analysis of the sending/receiving relationship between Lawrence Township and Washington Township, but spilled over into a report on districtwide overcrowding.
The school board decided to study the financial benefits of the sending/receiving relationship after Lawrence voters rejected $36.8 million in borrowing for school construction in a 1997 referendum. The bonds would have raised money to build a new middle school and to combine the existing middle school and high school into a high school campus.
School district officials have not decided whether the referendum will be for a new school or for additions to existing schools, said school board president Gerri Hutner. The decision will be made after gathering community input, and after Washington Township releases its own report on the sending/receiving relationship in June.
Lawrence Township is still attracting new residents and new students, said Assistant Superintendent of Schools Dr. Bruce McGraw. For example, 60 houses have been sold in the 320-unit Liberty Green subdivision off Lawrence Station Road. Families living there have 45 school-aged children — 15 of whom are under five years old, he said.
Dr. McGraw said he is concerned that proposed square footage requirements, issued by the state Department of Education, may have an impact on the schools’ capacity.
The elementary schools will not be overcrowded, under the proposed requirements, Dr. McGraw said. But the Lawrence Intermediate School, which houses grades 4-6, may exceed the standard. Temporary classroom trailers may be needed at LIS as soon as next year, he said.
Lawrence High School, which already is overcrowded, will continue to be so, he said. Three temporary trailers have been installed behind Lawrence High School, and another one is on the way for the 2000-01 school year.
To accommodate the growing enrollment, there are four lunch periods at Lawrence High School, Dr. McGraw said. The first lunch period begins at 10:15 a.m. Seniors are allowed to leave school to alleviate overcrowding in the cafeteria, he added.
Some opponents of the 1997 bond referendum alleged that a new high school would not be needed if the sending/receiving relationship was terminated, but the financial analysis prepared by the accounting firm of Druker Rahl & Fein shows there is a monetary benefit to keeping the Washington Township high schoolers.
During the 1999-2000 school year, Washington Township paid $2 million in tuition for its 237 high schoolers, but the real cost to the Lawrence school system was only $756,000 — which means the school district “profited” by $1.3 million, said Conrad Druker of Druker Rahl & Fein. That revenue reduced the tax bill for a residence assessed at $155,000 by about $80, he said.
Mr. Druker said that even if Washington Township did not send its students to Lawrence High School, the same number of teachers and staff would be needed.
Ending the sending/receiving relationship is not easy, Superintendent of Schools Dr. Claire Sheff Kohn said. The Washington Township students would be phased out of the high school over several years, she said.