Controversial School Budget Passed
Volume 49, Issue 2
By David Crohn

Voters approved the 2005-2006 Fire Island Free Union School District budget May 17 by a count of 117-58. This year’s budget, effective July 1, is $4,521,567, up from $4,403,266—an increase of 2.69 percent.
Vernon Henriksen was voted back to the school board with 140 votes, and Judy Phelan was elected with 91 votes to replace Andrew Athing, who had been appointed to finish the term for a board member who resigned last year. Ali Beqaj lost, with 71 votes.
The budget was accepted begrudgingly by some, who felt that the amount has surpassed the relatively modest needs of this tiny district.
“I guess it passed because they had put out that if the contingency budget went through that it would cost the taxpayers more. Nobody wants to pay more if they don’t have to,” said Ocean Beach resident Cathy Wolkoff. The alternative would have meant a 3.24 percent increase.
Questions were raised particularly over the budget’s administrative component, which saw an increase of more than $70,000, even as the number of students in the district has decreased by one, with 78 expected to enroll in September. The number of teachers has stayed roughly the same for the 2005-2006 school year.
Among other expenses, more than $200,000 is being spent on salaries for the superintendent and other school officials, up from $192,600; about $1.36 million has been set aside for teachers’ salaries and supplies such as textbooks and educational equipment. A significant increase is in the transportation line: $535,496 this year, up from $489,409 last year.
Wolkoff supports the district and feels that the kids in this unique area deserve every opportunity to get a solid education. “I’m all for the things that the kids get; it’s a difficult place to live and I’m for anything that makes their lives better.”
And yet, she voted against the budget.
“They’re doing the same old thing only the administrative side of things is going up. They say we are fortunate because we don’t pay the high taxes of the mainland, which is true, but just because we pay low taxes doesn’t mean you don’t have to be careful with the money,” said Wolkoff. As Superintendent Wendell Chu is quick to point out, school taxes for Islanders are some of the lowest in Suffolk County, if not all of Long Island.
“We understand no one wants to pay higher taxes and we are very conscious of trying to be as cost effective as we can but that’s not always as easy as it can be on FI,” said Chu.
Aside from the objections over higher taxes, some residents claim they have not been adequately informed over how the money is spent, and especially that it is being spent responsibly.
“We are in favor of a school district on the island, we just think it’s too rich and should be paired down. And, the District has failed to explain every item, line by line,” said Alan Brockman, president of the Fire Island Pines Property Owners Association, a group that has been actively opposed to the budget and what it sees as overspending by the school district in recent years.
“If you ask me a question I am happy to answer it. We are also trying to post a more robust Web site to list that info because we don’t want to contract it out. [Contractors] want thousands of dollars to do it and that doesn’t seem like something to spend that much on,” Chu said.

History
The budget has had a storied history in recent years, as debate, compromise, and even litigation have shaped its 2005 incarnation.
Most recently the school board removed a controversial pair of proposals from the budget, after they were defeated in a January referendum. One was the $900,000 Construction Proposition, which sought to add a small storage facility to the Woodhull gymnasium and bleachers to the basketball court; also, a 25-year-old fuel tank would have been replaced under the proposition. This was described as “just a long overdue common sense project” by school board member Vernon Henriksen in the April Woodhull Flyer.
The second, more controversial, proposal was the Library District Proposition, a move to create an independent library district in the area, which would allow membership in the Suffolk County Cooperative Library System. Proponents saw this as a way to save tens of thousands of dollars by creating an alternative to the old system, in which residents purchased access to the Suffolk County branch on the mainland.
According to Chu, confusion between the two propositions garnered bad publicity for both. “People thought we were going to build a new library, which is a tremendously expensive undertaking, and that just wasn’t the case,” he said. As of this writing, there are no plans to bring either proposition before the public again.
In addition, at an April Fire Island Association meeting several members questioned Chu’s holding the vote during the winter and a perceived lack of effort by the school in communicating the its agendas.

Adult Education
Costing $30,000, the adult education program is a relative drop in the bucket in the multimillion dollar budget. But consider that this amount represents a 1,000 percent increase over last year’s apportionment, and you can understand what the program has meant in the lives of its participants.
Revived last September by Ocean Beach resident Nancy Roberts, the program offers a variety of classes, lectures, and discussion groups, and in so doing has sought to bring a sense of community to Fire Island’s many far-flung residents.
“This is something that didn’t happen before—now we all know each other and help each other,” said Roberts, a former broadcaster and activist.
The focus from the beginning had been on providing a solace for year-rounders, who face long stretches of isolation during the notorious Fire Island winters. In this regard the Woodhull School was seen as ideal since it’s the only building on the island with light and heat 365 days a year.
The response was so overwhelming, people “went so crazy for it,” Roberts said, that she has sought to increase funding to keep the program going through the summer months and beyond, offering activities for the diversity of visitors the island sees year round.
Fire Island School District Superintendent Wendell Chu sees the program as an opportunity to reach out to Islanders without kids in the district who nonetheless pay taxes to live here. “We’ve had a tremendous response to it this year. It’s a great way to offer value-added services to everyone,” he said.