The facilities manager in Rochester told the Board of Selectmen on April 10 that for weeks he has been self-assessing handicap accessibility within Rochester buildings and properties, and he gave the board a summary of what steps he would like to take next to bring the town into Americans with Disabilities Act compliance.

Facilities manager Andrew Daniel invited Rochester resident Andrew Revell to address the selectmen, bringing his perspective to the matter as a man whose mobility relies on a wheelchair.

Revell, a gerontology professor at UMass Dartmouth, has been assisting other towns with ADA self-assessment and transition plan development. He looks for ways to improve resources for people with disabilities, he said, including simple things such as parking, signage, and restroom access – or lack thereof.

“…Like our bathroom here,” said Revell. “I use the bathroom before I come here … and I have to leave here to use the bathroom somewhere else because it’s not accessible.”

Revell said he assisted the Town of Hudson in applying for grants for other resources, such as door-to-door transportation for the disabled. Younger people with disabilities are not eligible for council on aging transportation, he pointed out, and the Town of Rochester does not belong to a regional transit authority like Mattapoisett and Wareham do.

Revell suggested seeking to make Rochester a member of the Southeastern Regional Transit Authority to provide disability transportation.

“The major number one thing for people with disabilities is social isolation,” said Revell.

Revell asked the board to commit to pursuing the possibility of moving towards these goals, and asked whether the Town of Rochester would seek to form a Tri-Town commission on disabilities. He said Mattapoisett once had one, but it dissolved about a decade ago due to a low number of people with disabilities healthy enough to attend meetings.

“I think it would help get some people out of their homes … and meet some other disabled people,” Revell said.

Revell has two children at Rochester Memorial School. He said, “I’m very interested in disabled conditions for everybody, including our children. I’d like to think about children with disabilities, not just older people with disabilities.

“I’ve spoken with the two other towns,” said Daniel, regarding a regionalized effort to become ADA compliant. “And also your odds for grants would increase. That’s definitely a good option for Rochester to choose to be part of this community…. I think its well worth doing.”

The selectmen decided to consult with town counsel on the best way to move forward.

Daniel said he thought that he knew quite a bit about ADA compliance because of his knowledge of the building code, “But what I really learned was that I’d only just touched the surface.” He added that municipalities were supposed to be compliant by January 1996 under Title 2.

Daniel said a state grant for up to $250,000 is available for ADA compliance, and since the Town has already joined with the state in a community compact agreement, those funds would be even more possible.

Daniel has already submitted his self-assessment findings to the state for review of his evaluation and draft transition plan.

“Every building could use something,” said Daniel, “whether it be automatic door push buttons,” wider thresholds, or van parking spots. Daniel also advocated for looking into beach wheelchairs so that those with disabilities can access the shoreline.

“That’s a lot of work,” said Chairman Naida Parker. “Thank you.”

In other matters, Daniel also addressed the need for more filing space at the Town Hall Annex, again recommending the town seek a new model of movable file systems that could increase file storage by 50 percent. The cost would be around $52,000, a one-time expense that could be moved in the future should the Town find a viable option for a new town hall annex location.

The $52,000 will appear on the town meeting warrant as an article. Also on the warrant will be an article to appropriate $5,000 to join the two other Tri-Town towns in funding a “forensic financial audit” of ORR budget spending.

The deadline for submitting articles for the Annual Town Meeting on May 22 is April 22.

The next meeting of the Rochester Board of Selectmen is scheduled for April 24 at 6:30 pm at the Rochester Town Hall.

By Jean Perry

The Mattapoisett School Committee held a public hearing for the FY 2018 school budget prior to their regular meeting on April 10 at Center School. The public hearing was sparsely attended; however, the debate generated by a single attendee was significant.

Superintendent Doug White outlined the priorities of the school committee and the drivers behind the development of the budget, including promoting academic and social-emotional rigor, special education services, and technology and security needs. The budget, approved unanimously by the committee, is a 1.99% increase over last year, totaling $6,917,439.

White said overall student enrollment in the district has steadily decreased, showing the October 2016 enrollment of 484 students, of which 55 are students with disabilities. Due to a smaller cohort of students currently in Grade 3 moving through the district, the committee was able to shift a general education teacher from Grade 3 to kindergarten to maintain four sections of kindergarten after a teacher retired last summer, and reducing Grade 3 to three sections. Maintaining the number of sections for K-3 will keep the number of students under 20 per class.

White underscored a portion of the budget that reflected an increase in Individual Education Plans, known as IEPs, as well as the district philosophy that special education students be educated within the school district and integrated in the classroom and the school community.

White noted the importance of “meeting the needs of students with special needs and with IEPs and providing a good and appropriate free education.”

The budget reflects a .4 increase in the position of the school psychologist, increasing that position from .6 to full time, and expanding the job description to include behavior analyst as part of her job. This in-house position will assist teachers with intervention in the classroom and assessment of students.

Director of Student Services Michael Nelson said, “It’s a point of pride that not just special ed teachers, but all staff, own the special education students.” He noted that providing special ed services within the school district saves the town money, and having the behavior analyst within the school rather than contracting it out is also a cost-saving measure. Nelson stated, “The cost of one teacher providing special education services to the whole school is equivalent to sending just one to two students out of district for those services.”

Committee member Jim Muse concurred with the value of this service, stating that Mattapoisett provides the special ed services “in the classroom, not out of district or a school within a school.”

When the public hearing was opened, Patricia Donaghue, chairman of the Finance Committee, voiced grave concerns for the financial future of Mattapoisett.

“Many of our town departments are significantly affected by the change in demographics of the town – it’s tough to get volunteer daytime firefighters, the Council on Aging has increased needs.” She said the money must come from somewhere, and the 16.8% decline since 2011 in school enrollment points to a declining need in the school department. With a teacher retiring, it provides an opportunity to reduce the staff, Donaghue said.

“I’m thinking globally. I spoke with friends in other towns like Medfield who say you’re living a dream with class sizes like this.” She continued, “Are we funding like we need, or is it luxury funding?”

Donaghue referred to studies she has read that do not indicate any correlation between class size and student academic success.

Committee Chairman James Higgins surmised that if 100 teachers were polled about class size, “They would suggest that smaller class size facilitates more effective assessment and assistance to special education students within the class.” He added, “The proof is in the pudding – our schools are ranked Level 1, our results in standardized tests show the benefit of small class size, and the inclusion of special ed in the classroom is a benefit for everyone.”

Donaghue noted the small kindergarten class sizes in 2016 and wondered about the accuracy of the projections for 2017.

Principal Rose Bowman noted that current small kindergarten class size is highly unusual, and her expectation of student enrollment in kindergarten is based on current fall 2017 enrollment and projections from now through the summer. If student needs change, the district will adjust accordingly, Bowman said.

Donaghue was unrelenting in her concern for the changing needs of the town, saying that small class sizes are nice, “But can we afford it? People need to ask the question of whether we are allocating our funding appropriately given our changing demographics.”

Bowman reiterated that there was not an increase in teacher salary budget, but that a teacher was shifted from a Grade 3 class to a kindergarten class, and the only salary increase was a .4 increase for the behavior analyst, which was a change in the school psychologist job description.

White responded to Donaghue’s concerns, noting that he had information that he could not specifically talk about because it related to special ed, “But it could significantly impact our existing classrooms. You’re a numbers person; I need to look at the human side.”

Muse added, “Our job is to look at the needs of the school, and we have had pretty accurate projections, shifting staff without adding personnel.” He noted that Mattapoisett is fortunate to have a school staff that has the flexibility to move from one expertise to another.

Committee member Carter Hunt concluded the public hearing with praise for the district staff. “We have to trust that they have done their due diligence for the needs of the classroom and to keep our schools in a position that we can be proud of.”

Later in the meeting, Higgins summarized the sentiment of the committee: “Education doesn’t cost, it pays.”

In other business, Bowman reported that the MCAS testing is starting and Associate Principal Kevin Tavares is assisting the students. Most of the testing is being done online, except for Grade 5 science, which is still done with pencil and paper.

            The next scheduled meeting of the Mattapoisett School Committee is May 15 at 7:00 pm. A Mattapoisett School Committee School Choice Hearing will be held at 6:30 pm the same evening.

By Sarah French Storer

The ORR school resource officer Matthew McGraw was asked by the Old Rochester Regional School Committee to look into reports of students speeding in their vehicles to school on Route 6, especially from the Marion direction. On April 5, McGraw reported his findings, prompting the committee and ORR Principal Michael Devoll to consider creating a policy to address the problem.

McGraw contacted the Marion Police Department about a month ago and over the past several weeks the Marion Police had more patrol cars monitoring student drivers on Route 6, resulting in several students being pulled over. That prior Friday alone, nine students were stopped for speeding.

“It’s like the Indie 500,” McGraw said, “especially at the end of the day.”

Speeding is of particular concern at the Marion S-curve where most violations have been witnessed.

McGraw wants the committee as well as administrators to consider a policy that would impose consequences upon student drivers caught speeding to and from school to warn them “to start acting smartly behind the wheel,” McGraw said, adding that police would prefer such measures to issuing citations to the student drivers.

“We don’t have a problem writing citations,” McGraw told the committee, saying first-time student speeders usually receive a verbal warning. “We don’t want to jam kids up with a driving history at such a young age.”

McGraw said he was looking for more of a “halfway smack on the hand” from the school end to help curb student speeding in the future.

McGraw had looked to other area schools for suggestions in policies addressing student vehicle operators, finding Old Colony’s method of communication with police and the community beneficial. When the school receives a report of student speeding, parking privileges are suspended.

Some suggestions for a policy at ORR included suspending parking privileges and also making the parking permit application “more intimidating,” as committee member James Muse suggested. McGraw said a system of having the student passengers of student drivers sign an agreement to report unsafe driving by their drivers might employ “peer pressure” in helping to solve the problem.

According to Devoll, “Very, very few senior high school students are on busses after school,” leaving many to either drive themselves or ride with other students as a way of getting to and from school.

The committee is looking towards drafting a policy to put into effect for the coming school year.

In other matters, the committee approved the establishment of a community garden on the ORR school grounds to be run by the students of the ORR special education transitional program for ages 18-22.

Teacher Becky Okolita received permission to go ahead with a 30- by 90-foot garden to be located behind the school, which will be piloted by the four students currently in Okolita’s class.

“We are looking for real life opportunities to integrate functional academics and life skills and transitional skills,” Okolita told the committee.

Okolita said she got the idea by looking at the Capabilities organization in Dennis where adult clients with disabilities are working on a farm growing and selling vegetables and fruits as part of the program.

Okolita seeks to foster further community-based skills and integration for her students and has procured a $500 grant to help start up the project.

An experienced gardener in Marion, she said, has also joined in to assist Okolita in establishing the garden, even assisting her in compiling a list of much needed supplies and tools to get growing.

The garden would be accessible, she said, to people of all levels of mobility to become a true community garden. The fruits of their labor would be sold at local farmer’s markets, and Okolita said she might reach out to local organizations that help local families put food on their tables.

Okolita chose to name the project the EmpowORR garden, “Because I think that it’s important to empower students with the skills for a successful future.”

The EmpowORR garden project still needs donations of money as well as supplies. She has set up a fundraiser at www.gofundme.com/orrhsgardenandgreenhouse. Please contact Becky Okolita at rebeccaokolita@oldrochester.org for more information on how to donate supplies.

The next meeting of the Old Rochester Regional School Committee is scheduled for May 10 at 6:30 pm in the junior high media room.

By Jean Perry