The School Board

Needs To Change

To the Editor:

Make a difference in your tax bill. The Board of Education needs a change. The only board member on the side of Newtown citizens is Debbie Leidlein. The rest need to go. Expenditures have risen almost 10 percent while the student population has decreased by 211 students in three years. The board is unchecked in spending on such things as $20,000 for washing cement bleachers, $80,000 for new visitor bleachers, $2 million on the stadium and $200,000 on an uncompleted 30-by-40-foot greenhouse to name a few. They have outsourced 35 school bus drivers, contributing to the erosion of town-based generated income and turning their backs on those that have served faithfully for the last 82 years. The high school expansion is overbudget and to date still not finished. The town has spent an additional million dollars in legal fees attempting to get the job completed. To add insult to us all is the board voted a substantial raise to the top three policymakers. These three received compensation totaling almost $500,000 per year.

With the reduction of bus contracts we should be eliminating the head of transportation, not giving him a raise to do less.

Newtown residents — make a difference. Vote them out. Take back control of spending.

Jay Birden

26 Buttonshop Road, Newtown                                October 25, 2011