Despite public opposition, the Waukesha School Board has voted to close one elementary school and merge it with another
The Waukesha School Board on Wednesday decided to move forward on a proposed merger between two of its elementary schools after a lengthy discussion and public comment session.
Board members on a 5-3 vote approved a proposal to close Whittier Elementary School and send students and staff there to Hadfield Elementary School in the 2022-23 school year. Karin Rajnicek, Kelly Piacsek, Anthony Zenobia, Amanda Roddy and board president Joseph Como voted for the merger while board members Greg Deets, Bill Baumgart and Corey Montiho voted against it. Board member Patrick McCaffery was absent and excused from the meeting.
Before board members debated the merger, 28 people, including parents, district students and community members, spoke during the meeting's public comment session, mostly outlining their opposition to the plan and criticizing how the district has handled its finances.
The entire meeting lasted over five hours; more than two hours of the meeting centered on the merger and budget planning.
In that budget plan, Darren Clark, the district's chief financial officer and assistant superintendent for business services, discussed proposed 2022-23 budget cuts that include $175,000 in administrative staff cuts. Then Hadfield Elementary principal Mike Elliott and Whittier Elementary principal Brandy Hart gave a presentation about what classroom programming at the merged school would look like.
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Starting March 11, the district's school choice program will open for Hadfield and Whittier parents. It will close March 25.
The district's presentation said the district faces a $7 million to $7.5 million budget shortfall in the 2022-23 school year with a recurring $3 million or $4 million annual deficit.
Como said the merger is about long-term sustainability for the district.
"We do know that enrollment continues to decline. We have to address that. We have too much space. We have to address that. This isn't easy. It really isn't because it affects our students," Como said.
Montiho said he opposed to the merger, calling it "backwards" public policy from a budget standpoint. He thought the merger disincentivized the district's administration from making other hard decisions, such as cutting administrators.
"I want those other hard decisions to come first, and then if we cannot winnow down and make up that budget deficit, then we look at the hardest thing we need to do, (which) is close a school," Montiho said.
"I think, as I mentioned before, budget cuts hurt everybody," he added. "They should last be felt in the classroom."
The district had considered the merger due to declining enrollment, historically high increases in the cost of doing business and no increase in state per-student funding.
The district said it projects enrollment to continue declining until at least 2030, and said the declining enrollment is also occurring statewide.
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District superintendent James Sebert said in a March 7 email that there has been a declining birth rate in the district and that open enrollment and the district's school choice program also play a role.
The district also said in a previous presentation it chose to merge the schools at Hadfield because Hadfield has a larger capacity.
Ahead of the March 9 meeting, the district held three different listening sessions with parents in February to discuss the merger. Parents were first informed about the plan in January.
The plan did not come without concern, as a change.org petition started Feb. 26 by Whittier Elementary parent Kelsey Draves to oppose the merger had over 300 signatures. Draves and other parents were concerned about busing and how staff would accommodate large numbers of economically disadvantaged students, students with disabilities and students with behavioral problems.
Contact Alec Johnson at (262) 875-9469 or alec.johnson@jrn.com. Follow him on Twitter at @AlecJohnson12.
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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Waukesha School Board votes to merge Whittier and Hadfield schools
