BY LARRY RAMER
Staff Writer
MARLBORO — The superintendent of schools of Marlboro’s K-8 school system, David Abbott, said he would ask the Board of Education this year to consider solutions for easing potential overcrowding in the district. One of the options for the board to consider, he said, would be building a new facility.
Based on figures compiled by the school district’s demographer in December 2001, Abbott said, the district may need to build a new facility by the end of the decade. The superintendent said he would wait until after the demographer issues a new report on the projected growth of the district toward the end of this year before approaching the board on this matter. Abbott said he will not propose building a new middle school.
Other options for housing the approximately 900 new students that are expected to enroll in the district by 2007 would be to acquire trailers and increase class sizes.
"Unless we load up all of our schools and look at bringing in numerous trailers there has to be additional space" in the district, " Abbot said.
However, the superintendent said he would do his best to avoid asking the board to approve the construction of a new building.
"I will do everything I can to avoid building another facility, as long as it does not compromise the achievement and safety of our children," Abbott said.
Board member Bari Sobel said she believes district administrators would have difficulty finding land on which to build a new school.
"We had trouble finding land for the two new schools we just built (the Marlboro Early Learning Center and the Marlboro Memorial Middle School). It took Dr. Abbott two years to find the land. I can’t imagine going through that again," said Sobel.
The board member said she has "come to the realization that the numbers will continue to grow within schools and that inevitably class size will go up."
Sobel, who said she was saddened by the large number of students in the schools, added that she felt Marlboro was becoming a "big city."
In spite of her pessimism about the feasibility of building a new facility, Sobel said she would listen to any proposal by Abbott about ways of dealing with the increasing enrollment. Sobel said she also felt that town officials should work harder to limit population growth in Marlboro.
Board member Mark Orenzow said he would not rule out any option for coping with crowding in the schools until he sees enrollment figures and hears about options for dealing with the increased enrollment. The district might have to consider larger class sizes and trailers as short-term options, he said.
"Even though I wouldn’t support larger class sizes, I could live with it to get over the hump of larger enrollment. We could only use trailers in the short term, if we have no other option," Orenzow added.
Although he had hoped that the school district would have received land on the site of the Marlboro State Psychiatric Hospital years ago, Orenzow said he is not sure if land on the site would be made available to the school district in time to handle the current enrollment surge. Orenzow said he believes state law should be changed to force developers to pay fees that would help town cope with the cost of educating students who move into new housing developments.