We, concerned parents, educators, responsible citizens — along with other and diverse individuals who cherish a hope for this county's future— request that the nine members of the Huntingdon Area School Board take a fresh look at the arguments against an anticipated move to call for a formal meeting on the closure of Southside Elementary School. Alternatives to an expensive realignment and closing-a-building scenario exist, if you choose to review them, alternatives that avoid much pain and trauma. Closing a school is always traumatic for students, teachers and community (Smithfield and the adjacent greater Woodcock Valley region) alike. Such an idea should be brought forward NOT as a money-saving or space-saving measure: rather, only as a final option when bankruptcy is around the corner with no offer of help being foreseen. While recognizing that a convoluted value-weighing survey presented to a select, small group appeared to make a case for realignment, we wish you to look well beyond that to the much broader picture. Southside and Standing Stone had consolidated four historic (older) elementary schools, not without controversy, into two modern structures. Southside was "birthed" with a promise from an earlier Board that two neighborhood schools would be built to serve the DIstrict, and so they have done. Both are well maintained, are in fine condition and absent any debt load. Were public schools analyzed from a more business-like perspective, we would refer to them as two major company assets.

To begin to set forth the broader picture, then: in many ways an elementary school amounts to the most important asset a community with a population of young families can boast of. Its very existence enhances property values. Year after year it attracts new homebuyers who seek a quality way of life for growing families in the region it serves. Its presence shortens bus runs; it is there and available for after-school community events. A school close to home is less intimidating to the very youngest pupils than is a more crowded school requiring bussing through and past a town; and in Southside's case, situated as it is in one of the county's few growth regions minutes from the Corps of Engineers' Raystown acreage, it provides ample space for population growth far on into the future. Underutilized space inside a building also permits possible expansion of the educational program without incurring the expense of adding on to buildings elsewhere. Must we remind you that the elementaries were constructed for use by teachers and children, not for the convenience of the District's administrative staffers. We object to the very idea of Southside's being given away (or sold at a fraction of its original cost). It represents an investment of taxpayer dollars: not a personal monetary investment by nine people with the legal authority to close it. They, the School Board, are in effect trustees of a property paid for by the taxpayers.

Finally, we are fully aware that the District's Superintendent, Mr. Foster, has advanced budgetary considerations as the one pressing reason for this discussion on closing. Raises in property taxes are a limited option; annual expenditures by the District rise in advance of the rate of inflation. To address that concern, we propose reaching out to the community thaat the Southside building serves on the part of the Board and the parents. Should you board members not give the community which Southside serves a chance to explore and unearth methods yet unmentioned of supporting its children's primary education? A nonprofit foundation may take time to create, but once in place it could solicit funds from across the region served by Southside— particularly from prospering businesses which decidedly have a stake in the area's livability. We also recommend opening discussions with this county's representatives in Harrisburg on providing more meaningful relief as well as fresh support to local boards that are stressed financially. The Commonwealth mandates, most significantly, pension contributions at a high fixed rate; and ever-growing costs for educating pupils with defined needs whenever standard classroom instruction cannot suffice. We know these costs were not put on us taxpayers by our Board but through state law and regulation; and we hold that the entity that mandates such costs should pay for the majority of them. Just don't dismiss the possibility that help from the Legislature may be down the road in terms of tax relief. For all the reasons cited, we ask the Board to postpone further consideration of a school closing until exhausting all opportunities for keeping it open receive a thorough look. We not only, in other words, want this Board to "save" our school at Southside but need it to ask us all how we can work as a team to help them "save" it. We do applaud the Board for taking steps at its July meeting to cut a few thousand dollars here and there from its budget; we believe that most of us will not object to much deeper cuts so long as the teaching of basic skills does not suffer adversely. Please, think all this over and see the ale of a change of direction in response to your constituents,' your neighbors,' wishes. Seek an ongoing and significant community involvement in, and participation by, the public at large. A one-time session for comments followed by a second board session to take a vote may be legal, strictly speaking, but we, the public, ask you please NOT to "go there." You must realize that doing so is quite likely to further jeopardize support of public education in this district and to further accelerate the already significant flight of families to home-schooling and charter schools.