The board didn’t field any direct comments on line items in its proposed $21.7 million 2023-24 budget during two public hearings — one in Lake Placid on May 9 and another in Wilmington on May 2. No one spoke during Lake Placid’s budget hearing. However, a few Wilmington residents voiced support for BOCES programming and expressed concern that middle-high school principal Theresa Lindsay’s added workload over the last year could be too much to handle, especially as Dean of Students and Athletic Director John Burdick plans to leave his positions at the end of this semester to return to teaching math in the 2023-24 school year. However, the school board on Tuesday appointed Jeff Nemec, who was a teacher and coach at Northwood School for around 10 years, as the new dean of students and athletic director.

At the beginning of the 2022-23 school year, former middle school principal Lindsay became principal of both the middle and high school following the departure of former high school principal Tammy Casey, who is now the AuSable Valley High School principal. At the time, district Superintendent Timothy Seymour said the consolidation of these two positions was an acknowledgment of the district’s downward trend in enrollment and an effort to bring more cohesion to the middle high-school. To help Lindsay handle students who had behavioral or academic problems at school, the district simultaneously created a dean of students position, which Burdick filled.

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Repair reserve

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Former LPCSD Board of Education President Rick Preston was the only person to speak during a separate hearing on the district’s repair reserve fund in Lake Placid on Tuesday. He asked the board whether it plans to replenish the fund once the money is spent. The $1 million repair reserve fund was created with voter approval in May 2022, and the upgrades to the middle-high school’s weight room and auditorium are expected to mostly deplete that balance.

Dana Wood, the district’s assistant superintendent for business, finance and support services, said that the board’s ultimate goal is to replenish the repair reserve fund for any projects that might come up, noting that the district is slated for a buildings condition survey this summer. The district also has a “healthy” unassigned fund balance, he said, and some of those funds could be moved to the repair reserve for future use.

The state’s school budget vote day is May 16. LPCSD voters will also select three new school board members from four candidates — Nathan Hammaker, John Hopkinson, Douglas Lansing and Ryan St. Louis — and vote on two propositions proposing to increase funding for the E.M. Cooper Memorial Library in Wilmington and lease two buses for the 2023-24 school year. District voters will also have an opportunity to take an exit poll after voting, which will ask whether or not voters believe the district should enact state-ordained property tax exemptions for district veterans and emergency service workers.