[A]ct 46 vote results from Tuesday looked topsy-turvy, as some residents in Grand Isle County — with no history of working together — unified their school districts while Barre Town — which shares a high school with Barre City — rejected a merger.
In addition, voters in Addison Northeast Supervisory Union approved their merger despite a nagging dissent by three members of the study committee.
“There’s a much longer history of making rude gestures across the lake at each other than there is in trying to work together,” Julow said in a previous interview.
Yet three of the towns decided to merge their school districts Tuesday, with Grand Isle approving the measure 575 to 301, North Hero voting 394 to 17 and Isle La Motte agreeing 243 to 60. South Hero decided to go it alone, voting 737 to 380 against the merger. Alburgh decided not to vote on the merger.
The new Champlain Islands Unified Union School District is to begin operating in 2019.
“It is a very positive step forward for these three towns, and it will have a very positive effect on the children from the three towns in the new district,” Julow said.
The merger in Barre City and Barre Town — which would have combined school boards from two elementary-middle schools with Spaulding High School and a regional career and technical center, while bringing tax breaks to the area — might have seemed like a straightforward ask. When it was proposed to the State Board of Education in October, members were surprised the study group hadn’t brought the issue to a vote during the first phase of unifications to garner even more tax savings.
Tommy Walz, who represented Barre City on the committee, presented its proposal to the state board. He said the separation between Barre City and Barre Town had never made sense to him. He said it was “absurd” to have four school boards and two school districts. The plan included no changes to the schools, just the merging of boards.
Alice Farrell, the other presenter from the study group, described the communities as roughly equal in population but said the city had more poverty and the town was more affluent.
On Tuesday, 57 percent of Barre Town voters refused to merge districts with Barre City; the tally was 2,108 to 1,611. In the city, residents voted overwhelmingly — 2,067 to 694 — to unite.
Study committee member Sonya Spaulding said it will be more clear what went wrong once the exit poll results and surveys are in.
Spaulding said she is hopeful they can hold a revote and be more successful. “Some of the concerns were expressed very late in the game, and we didn’t have a lot of time to give data and correct that information,” she said. “Hopefully, if there is a next time we can get that information out to people.”
There was relatively smooth sailing for the Addison Northeast communities that proposed merging even though three members of the study committee broke away and campaigned against the plan.
All five towns voted in favor of uniting — even Starksboro and Lincoln, the towns that would have to change the way they vote on their school budget. All three committee members who disagreed with the plan were from those towns and said the move to Australian ballot for budget votes was a major reason for their disagreement.
“It has been an interesting process to think about a new future for our school governance, and there has been a lot of hard work put in along the way,” said Jen Stanley, who chaired the study committee. “As we go forward, it will be important for the new unified board to engage people from different perspectives and ensure many voices are heard as we form our new unified district.”
Stanley provided a breakdown of the vote: Bristol, 1,105 to 550; Lincoln, 391 to 357; Monkton, 785 to 355; New Haven, 668 to 338; and Starksboro, 430 to 408.
Addison Northeast Superintendent Patrick Reen said he was pleased with the vote. “The Act 46 study committee worked incredibly hard for many months, and all of that hard work has come to fruition with this decision. ANESD is poised to come together as a single community to work together to improve outcomes for our students,” he said.
Jeff Francis, who heads the Vermont Superintendents Association, reacted to the votes by saying it seemed that both Addison Northeast and the Grand Isle communities came together because it would help the students and taxpayers. He added that Vermont’s demographic and fiscal challenges are driving a need to pull together to make sure every Vermont child can have a quality education.