VERNON, N.J.—The next time the people of Vernon Township vote on candidates for their local school board, they and the rest of the country also will be picking candidates for the U.S. Senate and Congress and deciding who will be president for the next four years.

In a 6-3 decision, the Vernon Township Board of Education voted on Thursday to move the date of the school board election to the general election date in November, thus joining Vernon with some 250 other communities throughout the state that also have taken advantage of a new state law allowing them to do so.

While no specific deadline was written into the new law, the state Department of Education had advised communities that were considering moving the date of this year’s school election that they needed to do so by Fri., Feb. 17.

The new law, which was signed by Gov. Chris Christie on Jan. 17, also stipulates that communities moving their school elections to November will see the elimination of voting on school budgets that fall within a 2 percent cap on local tax levy increases enacted into state law last year. Though the cap exempts costs incurred as a result of enrollment increases and for teachers’ pension and health costs, all other spending must adhere to a 2 percent cap on increases in the local tax levy or else be presented to voters as a separate ballot question. Any rejection by voters of the additional spending would be final, with no appeal allowed.

Like other districts that have chosen to move their elections, Vernon now must adhere to the new election calendar for at least the next four years. Board members whose terms were set to expire this April also will continue serving through November.

“I see this as a promise to keep the budget at or below the cap while removing politics from the classroom,” said Board President Douglas Castellana.

The decision by the Vernon school board faced stiff opposition from some board members and members of the public including Martin Pirringer, parent of a high school senior—and even some board members who voted in favor of the measure acknowledged that reaching a decision had not been easy. Still, the decision cheered many of the 700 or so members of the Vernon Township Education Association (VTEA), which had lobbied in favor of the move.

“We’re thrilled,” said VTEA President Alicyn Guilfoyle, a speech language therapist at Glen Meadow and Vernon Township High schools. Both she and Chuck McKay, the district’s K-12 language arts supervisor, previously had urged the board to move the election, arguing that doing so would remove politics from the budget process while assuring the public that there would be limits to the rate of future tax increases.

The optimism expressed by many teachers contrasted sharply with the disappointment voiced following the vote by board members Robert Hughes and John McGowan, both of whom voted against the move and said it was a mistake to deprive the public of a vote on a $72 million school budget. Both also expressed fear that school board elections now would become more rather than less politicized.

“I’m a Board of Education member so I have to support whatever the majority decides and work within that, but I feel very ill at ease with some of the potential ramifications,” McGowan said.

Hughes acknowledged his disappointment but said that he, too, would support the board’s decision. Earlier, in an impassioned appeal, Hughes had urged some of his colleagues to rethink their position. “We’re disenfranchising the people of Vernon,” he said. “Too many things are being run by Washington and Trenton, and I don’t like it. Nobody is better able to decide how the children of Vernon should be taught than the parents and the citizens of Vernon.”

Hughes said that even in a nonpartisan election, there was “potential mischief” if a political party in power decided to put forth a slate of candidates for the school board.

“All the people voting in November for a presidential election will know damn well who the people in power want on this board,” Hughes said, gesticulating and even pounding the table at one point. “If in November they can put three people on this board and then in a gubernatorial election the next year put three more people on this board, there could be six people on this board who don’t give a damn about the children of this town.”

McGowan echoed Hughes’s comments, saying, “I may not be as loud as Bob, but I’m just as impassioned about it.” McGowan said the support of the board’s work by members of the public was “precious” and that it was important that they be given an opportunity to weigh in on the budget each year.

“In the last 36 years, 33 times the people in this community have endorsed our work,” McGowan said. “We’ve enjoyed and cultivated that relationship, and we owe it to the people to continue to rely on their judgment.”

Bradley Sparta, who joined Hughes and McGowan in opposing the move to November, said he had been “on the fence” about the issue for several weeks but said he too thought it was wrong to deprive the public of a vote on the budget.

Lori Parrott, who was one of the six board members to vote in favor of moving the election, said having it in November would likely result in more voter turnout for school elections. “I don’t think all of the voters will be out to cut budgets. I think we’ll get a more diversified group, and I think that will make the process much more transparent,” she said.

Cynthia Auberger, who also voted in favor of the move, shared Parrott’s assessment. “My job is not to determine who’s going to be voted on this board. That is for the people of Vernon to decide, and I have faith in them,” she said.

Rounding out those in favor of the move to November were board members Edward DeYoung, David Zweier, and Ed Gilson.

Both Zweier and DeYoung acknowledged that they too had struggled in reaching the decision they were about to make. Zweier, for his part, paid heed to the concerns voiced by Hughes. “I really appreciate your comments, Bob, and it really has sunk in with me, but I still feel the best thing for the people of Vernon is to move the election to November,” Zweier said.

Board members Bob Hughes and John McGowan, the two board members who spoke most passionately on the issue — both were against changing the election. PHOTO CREDIT: Eric Obernauer

“I’ve lost more hours of sleep in the past couple of weeks over this issue than over anything else in a long time,” said DeYoung. “There are valid points on both sides—the concern about politicizing the election and the concern about taking away the people’s vote on the budget. They’re all valid points. My decision that I make tonight will be for one reason—to make the Vernon school district that best that we possibly can and to balance the needs of our students, faculty and staff with the taxpayers of Vernon.”

Under the new law, even if the Board of Education had not voted to move the date of the school election to November, voters could have forced the change themselves by passing a public question on the matter. The township council, which met this past Thursday on the same night as the Board of Education, also could have voted under the new law to force a change in the school board elections to November.

Council President Brian Lynch, for his part, previously described the issue as one “unlike anything I’ve ever seen a local government have to deal with.” In the end, said Lynch, a majority of council members felt it would be wrong to jeopardize their relationship with the Board of Education by having one elected body impose its will on another.

“I would like to defer to the Board of Education and trust them to do the right thing in this situation,” Lynch said. “I know for a fact that there is a lot of opinion on both sides of the fence, but the people on the Board of Education were elected and these are those tough decisions that they’re going to have to make.”