LAKEHURST – Councilman Robert McCarthy brought up concerns about the borough school district during a recent Borough Council meeting.
“They did approve another superintendent bonus. It is frightening to think from my perspective as we get very little in the way of answers how we could possibly, given the nature of education in this pandemic, state how we are achieving merit goals but apparently we are as it was approved unanimously” McCarthy said.
“That is crazy,” Mayor Robbins said.
He added, “it is concerning because in going over the monthly bill statements which was $348,693.57 as of October now the cash balance as of August 31 was negative $178,438.34. The August 18 balance was a negative $396,971.94 which would indicate some money has been received during that point. This has been a trend in my reports for well over a year now.”
“The continued reasoning is slow state funding. I don’t know how the funding is distributed exactly but it doesn’t seem possible that the school can maintain negative balance for years on end. I have some concerns where we are going,” McCarthy said.
State law makes towns collect school taxes and then pay the appropriate share over to the district.
Merit bonuses were implemented during the Christie administration. At the time, he placed a cap on superintendent salaries. The merit bonuses were challenges a superintendent would strive to achieve and get a bonus in pay for accomplishing.
McCarthy said substitute pay was increased but that was universal and happening in all districts during the pandemic. Two transportation contracts were approved for special needs students. He added that no one else was present to attend the last School Board meeting.
“There was one teacher and myself. They have not offered any virtual board meetings for several months including the ones they were having in the middle of the day in the middle of the week, at four in the afternoon, two in the afternoon. One was 11:30 in the morning which brings me back to my negative balance question. It is unusual what is going on,” McCarthy said.
Councilwoman Hodges noted that some who run for the board do so “to benefit their own child.”
Councilman Davis said that some run with “a real fire in their belly but that fire seems to go out.”
McCarthy also said that the Board of Education reported no positive cases of the coronavirus. “They are currently, preemptively prepping by making purchases to repopulate the school for in-person learning environment. They are preparing for when and if the state and federal government allows their return.”
McCarthy also noted that the Lakehurst PTA “is in desperate need of membership.” He also noted the loss of many long serving teachers, “20- and 39-year teachers in the district during the year. There is something to that as well. You don’t generally leave one tenured position at the top of the pay scale and leave and go elsewhere. You start at the bottom.”
The Manchester Times reached out to Lakehurst School Superintendent Loren Fuhring regarding the concerns expressed by the governing body.
Fuhring said the August financial report, “was addressed at the board meeting and (School District Business Administrator Barry) Parliman explained that the state does not provide payments in June and August in a typical year, however added a non-payment to the month of September.”
“Unfortunately, this left a deficit in our cash flow, which has since been resolved with the district receiving three payments in the month of October. The state normally does not provide state aid payment in June or August and for current year, due to COVID-19, only one payment was sent in September,” Fuhring added.
Fuhring noted that the School District does not provide bonuses to staff members and regarding board vacancies “one seat on the board of education was open several months ago due to a member of the board moving out of Lakehurst.”
Two seats were available for election, one being this opening for a three-year term and an additional seat from a retiring board member, who served 18 years to the Lakehurst school community.
The superintendent added that one administrator recently filed for early retirement due to medical reasons and one teacher retired after 25 years of service.
“For the last several months, the Lakehurst School District Board of Education meetings were held in person and open to the community. We have not utilized Zoom for our meetings in quite some time. The district had difficulty obtaining quorum in a timely fashion to submit required documents to the state regarding the Restart and Recovery Plan for the November board meeting and the only time this could be accomplished was at 9 a.m. on a Friday,” Fuhring said.
“Currently, the school district is still offering full remote instruction to families, however we are bringing students back into district for the second marking period for five-day a week, in-person learning,” the superintendent said.
Fuhring added, “students will be present on an abbreviated day schedule. The Lakehurst School District has been extremely successful with our plans and procedures to ensure the safety and well-being of all staff and students.”
The School Board’s next meeting will be at 6:30 p.m. on December 9 at the Lakehurst Elementary School on Union Avenue.
