CHARLEMONT — Heath is about halfway through the process of joining the Hawlemont School District, and Heath, Hawley and Charlemont are now figuring out how to have equal votes on the committee, as has been the case since the district was established in the 1950s.
The Hawlemont-HeathRegionalization Working Group last week proposed to require all three towns approve a budget at annual town meetings for it to pass. The working group says this will prevent the two smaller towns, Heath and Hawley, from having too much say over Charlemont – a larger town with more taxpayers.
State law mandates that two-thirds of the towns in a regional school district approve a budget for it to pass. For example, Mohawk Trail Regional School District needs six of its nine towns to approve the budget.
The working group established early on that each town in the impending Hawlemont-Heath School District would have an equal say on the school committee. The new committee would have six members, two from each town, all with a single vote. This differs to Mohawk Trail Regional School District, where members’ votes are weighted according to town size.
“We all agreed on having equal representation,” said Hussain Hamdan, a Hawley selectman and a member of the working group. “This is the way it’s always been for Hawlemont.”
The new proposal requires approval from all three town selectboards, according to Robert Gruen, member of both the working group and the Mohawk school committee representing Heath. If all three towns approve the proposal, it will be included in the Hawlemont-Heathregionalization agreement, Gruen said. The agreement will be reviewed by the towns’ lawyers and then sent to the Mass. Department of Elementary and Secondary Education and the state attorney general. The agreement is likely to appear on the warrant at town meetings in May.
The two proposals – one to have equal representation on the committee, and the other to require a unanimous vote to approve the school budget – also require a special exception from the Legislature, Gruen said. It’s not clear whether this exception will be sought before or after the town meetings.
If all goes according to plan, the regionalization agreement would be finalized mid-2020, Gruen said. When this is confirmed, Heath, which now pays tuition to send students to Hawlemont, will be part of the newly minted Heath-Hawlemont School District.
“There are a lot of balls in the air,” Gruen said. “But we have to keep moving forward, otherwise it’ll be five years before this is done.”
Reach Grace Bird at: gbird@recorder.com or 413-772-0261, ext. 280