By Dan King
The results are in and the three new faces on the Whitehall Board of Education will be Pat Norton, Mike Rocque, and Tony Scrimo.
Norton was the leading vote-getter with 313, Rocque was in a very close second with 310, and Scrimo recorded 286 votes.
Because he was the third leading vote-getter, Scrimo was sworn in to the remaining four years of former member Jim Huntington’s term by District Clerk Martha Bascue, following the Tuesday election.
The seats that Norton and Rocque will take over were previously occupied by Mark DeLuca and Ted LaRose. Both Norton and Rocque will be taking on full five-year terms.
Norton and Scrimo are both former educators, Scrimo at the secondary level and Norton at the elementary level. Additionally, Norton has held multiple elected offices, as she currently is a trustee on the village board and has previously served as mayor of Whitehall.
Norton said she is excited to turn the Board of Education into a “role model for the community,” and return the board’s focus to education.
Likewise, Scrimo said he was excited to take “a personal interest in preserving and improving the quality of education Whitehall students receive.”
Rocque is a retired U.S. Army veteran, with over 20 years of service to the country.
Much like Norton and Scrimo, Rocque ran on a campaign focused on fiscal and academic accountability, while also focusing a good brunt of his attention on the process of hiring a new superintendent. He said there should be no rush in the hiring process and that the board should focus on finding a superintendent who matches the goals of the community.
Rocque said he was excited to bring a “common sense” approach to the board.
After Scrimo, the fourth highest vote-getter was Harold Nicholson with 186, followed by Marcia Rocque with 182, Steve St. Claire with 147, Joseph Swahn with 81, and Stiling Knight with 31.
Norton and Rocque will be sworn in during the board’s July 13 meeting.
The Whitehall Board of Education now consists of Rocque, Norton, Scrimo, Frank Barber, Amy Austin, Jeremy Putorti, Sam Kingsley, James Brooks and President Virginia Rivette.
Budget and buses
The highly controversial school budget, which Austin called “fiscally irresponsible” because it was created without knowing what type of schedule, and thus staff, the district would have, ultimately passed by a count of 377 “yes” votes and 97 “no” votes.
Initially business administrator Joe Karas and then-superintendent Liz Legault had drafted two separate budgets for two different potential schedules that the school district could use in the upcoming year.
The $15,044,343 spending plan will raise $5.27 million more in taxes than this year, which equates to a 0.9 percent tax levy increase. The state caps tax levy increases at 2.4 percent, so the district falls well within the cap.
Of the $15 million budget, $8,825,000 will come from state aid, while another $400,000 will come from the district’s fund balance.
Voters also approved the busing deal for the 2015-16 school year, by a measure of 314 “yes” votes to 91 “no” votes.