Readying For The Reval
            The so-called "Large Parcel tax code provision, Section 1316 of the state's Real Property Tax Law, allows school districts, and county governments, to adopt annual resolutions that would allow a district to eliminate disparities among all properties if, and only if, the large property in question 1) constitutes five percent or more of the total assessed value of a city or town; 2) the full value of the property is at least five million dollars, and 3) the percentage of difference between the State equalization rate and the local apportionment equalization rate for that property is at least five percent.
            Leifeld said this week that the meeting with ORPS in Albany was to get the percentage of difference between the town and state to under five percent. As a result, he and the Olive Town Board have started seeking bids for their town's first municipal revaluation of assessments in 27 years. If the percentages are brought down, the large parcel reapportioning of taxes paid to the Onteora School District and Ulster County would likely become moot.
            And yet, by Leifeld's new reckoning, his town's share of both taxes would still rise somewhere between 30 and 60 percent over the coming year.
            Leifeld added that everyone came away from the meeting, lawyers included, confused by percentages, as well as the state's refusal to give a final valuation for the reservoir.
            "How'd it go in the end? I'm really not sure," the supervisor asked himself. "They really confused us."
            Leifeld said he and LaMonda had been checking with lawyers to find out what's what before holding a town board meeting on the subject in the coming weeks and then going to the school board with new values and pleading for them not to hit Olive with a new apportionment.
            According to Leifeld, changes to Olive tax payers could be as much as $143 per $1000 of assessed value, were a full reapportionment enacted. Meanwhile, residents in the school district's other two main towns, Shandaken and Woodstock, would see their tax loads go down between $2 and $4 per $1000, representing savings of an average few hundred dollars per property.
            The supervisor estimated that Olive real estate has been going up an average 15 percent a year since 2001. He's unsure how that will end up effecting new tax distribution in light of the reservoir's new value.
            "We've got six weeks to get the numbers straight on this and it's all a mess," Leifeld said. "It sure as hell is frustrating, that's the only thing I can tell you for sure."
            Speaking after lawyers for the town talked with officials at ORPS on March 22, Leifeld added that although further indications were given that the new $360 million assessment for the reservoir was still holding, state officials were refusing to be definitive "until higher administrators signed off on it." He said he was unsure what that meant.
            He added that the lawyers had been told that an apportionment rate had to be approved, which he took to mean that a dedication to revaluation would be required so that the new city apportionment, which represents a 3 percent rate, would be matched by the rest of the town, currently at 1.2 percent because of the lengthof time it's been since the last reval.
            "I just want to make sure we don't get the worst of all worlds, and hit by the large parcel tax, a reval and rising costs for everything else all at once," the crusty supervisor croaked. "Hell, my taxes would go up $4,000- This all feels like some mysterious force is at work. I just want to get it all over with."

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School Budget

            Interim assistant superintendent Jeff Hanna outlined the cuts as well as the effects of a contingency budget, limited by law to a 2.76 percent increase, or $41,413,106, with a 4.72 percent tax increase, which would result if the voters defeat the budget proposal twice. For comparison purposes, business administrator Chuck Snyder provided figures on a rollover budget of $43,700,124, the cost of providing programs and services at their current level, with the required increases in retirement fund contributions, health insurance, and contracted staff salaries. The rollover budget, with West Hurley intact, would come to 8.43 percent over the current budget and bring the tax levy into double digits.

            The recommended six percent budget would require redistricting of elementary schools to distribute students evenly among the Woodstock, Bennett, and Phoenicia Elementary Schools, equalizing class sizes to 19 to 21 throughout the district, Rowe said. The closing of West Hurley would save a total of $781,000, starting with $361,000 in operational costs, including salaries for non-teaching staff and the principal. Another $200,000 would be saved with the elimination of four teaching positions due to the restructuring of classes, while the need for less teaching time in the areas of art, gym, music, and library would save $75,000. Fewer teachers and teaching assistants in the area of special education would cut $145,000. Cuts unrelated to West Hurley include reducing equipment acquisitions districtwide from $250,000 to $200,000; reducing all building budgets by five percent; eliminating three monitors in the high school and middle school; and reducing the school lunch program from five to three choices, without abandoning the effort to improve nutrition.
            The 4.3 percent budget alternative, to be presented if the first proposal goes down at the polls, eliminates the same items as the six percent budget, as well as cuts in academic intervention, elementary summer school, afterschool programs, the new nutritional menu lunch program, and districtwide field trips. Rowe said the cuts in both budgets represented priorities agreed upon by the administrative council, which includes all school principals and central office administrators. Barbara Boyce, director of Pupil Personnel Services, warned that the 4.3 percent budget "virtually eliminates prevention programs, which can have repercussions of higher costs down the line for mandated programs for kids at risk of failing or dropping out.".
            "The revenue side is, at best, a crap shoot," said Rowe, decrying the difficulty in devising a budget when revenues cannot be accurately predicted. "We are approaching the twentieth consecutive year when the odds are the state budget will be late. We're expected to meet our deadline, but they're not expected to meet theirs." The governor's proposed state budget gives Onteora a mere $12,000 raise over last year's state aid figure of about $6.9 million. The legislature may increase that number, but generally that decision is not made until after the school districts' May 18 deadline for the budget vote. Tax revenue estimates are based on last year's tax rolls and equalization rates, which will not be finalized for this year until July. Also included in the revenue is a $1.5 million fund balance of money left over from last year's budget and held in reserve for unexpected needs.
            Trustee Kathy Hochman asked whether any alternatives had been considered for the West Hurley building, and Rowe retorted that no outside uses can be solicited until the board decides whether to close the school. "Could we use the space creatively for programs like Indie or ASPPE [the program for teens with Asperger Syndrome]?" Hochman persisted, noting that even BOCES programs are sometimes housed in schools that are under regular operation. Rowe replied that BOCES has expressed interest in using four to six classrooms next year, and there is the possibility of private-sector businesses utilizing the space, but emphasized that the decision to close must be made before seeking a tenant. He added that he could not justify spending over $600,000 on a building that houses only 116 students, as enrollments continue to decrease.
            The board voted unanimously to include on the May ballot a proposition to purchase a used school bus and several smaller vehicles for student transportation at a total cost of $133,500.
            In the closing Public Comment section of the meeting, West Hurley parent Lori Kleine said, "I'm upset the choices are close the school, close the school, or close the school." She pointed out that the Woodstock Elementary School, although larger than West Hurley, is more run down, with an electrical system that cannot support many computers. She objected to the pattern of the last few years which has put her children in a different school each year and expressed concern that the consolidation into three schools will leave no room to grow. She also cited statistics from an article in the Middletown Times Herald-Record on school districts in Orange, Sullivan, and Ulster counties. According to the article, Onteora has the highest dropout rate, at 19.4 percent, while Walkill has 10 percent, and Kingston has eight percent. Onteora spent $15,000 per student in 2002-2003, and the area average is $11,000.
            At least two special school board meetings will be scheduled to discuss the budget and solicit public opinion before the April 19 deadline for budget adoption. The first special meeting will take place at the high school on Monday, March 29, at 7:00 p.m. Budget information is expected to be posted shortly on the district website, temporarily located at http://onteora.schoolwires.com/onteora/site/default.asp.
            In other business, representatives of the county legislature have agreed to meet with a few school board members in an informal discussion of the county's Van Dale Road bridge refabrication facility. The meeting had not yet been scheduled as of Monday night.

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 After 911

            The couple now work out of home, a former hunting lodge near Winne Road in Mt. Tremper, right on the Olive/Shandaken border, with their 2 year old daughter, Victoria, helping out as best she can. Paloma, who's at Phoenicia Elementary, is newly published in the most recent issue of Prima Materia, the Hudson Valley's literary periodical.
            Both Alma and James, who've become involved in a number of local activities from the Panther Mountain Picking Circle of bluegrass musicians to Afgrican Drumming classes at the Methodist Church in Phoenicia (not to forget a growing number of pro bono fundraising jobs for local non-profits), feel they've somehow broken out of the boxes of corporate America and are "beating the system" by creating a perfect rural life for raising their kids in- and growing their business and inner selves.
            "It's sweet working at home," says Alma, raised in New York's Puerto Rican community with a B.A. from Columbia University and over 20 years of management experience for not-for-profits and publications, including the Village Voice. "We started realizing we could do this as our business began shifting more and more to the computer and e-mails. The transition ended up being pretty easy."
            "We're a classic internet boom story in terms of moving up here," James says. He grew up in rural North Dakota and keeps the quizzical lilt of that cold terrain's accent. Yet his background is filled with brand management and strategic thinking work in high-end advertising settings that included vice-president positions at Young & Rubicam and Grey Advertising, handling such accounts as IBM and the United States Postal Service. He served as a consultant to non-profit organizations such as the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, the New York Consortium for New Music, and WBGO, a jazz public radio station in Newark, NJ. "There's a lot of similarities between here and where I grow up. I feel back home."
            Kopp and Rodriguez created their business with the future of their children in mind. They wanted to spend more time at home with them. So each morning they bring in a babysitter for a half day as the couple works side by side on separate computers, then split time with the baby the remainder of the day. They often work late after both kids are in bed to meet deadlines and stay ahead of their clients' needs.
Those clients, at present, include a number of New Jersey not-for-profits including the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, the Park Performing Arts Center in Union City and a host of high schools, churches and educational groups, several of which the company has helped found.
            Upstate, the couple has been building up a clientele by doing pro bono work and putting on workshops like a recent NYSERDA-based event in Kingston that drew over 54 representatives from the region's top not-for-profits.
            So how did they find us? Internet research was a component, but also the fact that Paloma joined a school ski club that would come to Belleayre each winter. After whittling their choices down to New Paltz, Woodstock and the Phoenicia/Olive area, they chose that which was most woodsy- and friendly.
            Moving up, they add, has not been without its hardships. To entertain a fully Internet-based business, they had to cut costs. Their house is not large, but it is more than adequate.
            Overall, though, the experience has been enriching- and full of surprises. They never anticipated the number of cultural choices available to us up here. Or the close friendships that can build rapidly. Or the general friendliness of close-knit communities that can often seem stand-offish at first.
            And how has it been working side by side, day in and day out?
            "It's actually been wonderful to learn to communicate on a business level with your spouse, to show respect and see how the skills centrifuge out," says James, who handles much of the strategizing part of the couple's business.
            "The only bad thing, if you could call it that, is that we end up talking about business all the time," adds Rodriguez, the grantwriting and researching half of the duo. "Everything gains continuity."
            Both comment about what it's been like to learn to appreciate night skies again.
            James mentions how, when the anti-globalization riots took place in Seattle in the late 1990s, he couldn't understand them. But now, after 9/11 and his own move away from urban life, away from the corporate world, he sees it merely as part of a necessary paradigm shift.
            Alma points out how hard it was to be in Jersey City, the nearest full community to the World Trade Center, after 9/11. She says it left everyone with "a hole in the heart," a tear in the city's streets.
            But that was then. And now, they're here. And planning on staying.
            Welcome!
            For further information on Kopp Rodriguez and Associates, or the always-invigorating Victoria and rising art star Paloma, call (845) 688-5128 or visit www.kopprodriguez.com.