Q&A with District 15 Board Members Up for Reelection

By Scott P. Moore
Standard Staff Reporter

Residents living within the confines of School District 15, also known as the Lawrence Union Free School District, will head to the polls on May 15th to vote on a proposed $93.1 million budget for the 2012-2013 school year and two Board of Education seats with incumbent members Abel Feldhamer and Uri Kaufman the only residents in the running. The South Shore Standard spoke with both men as they prepared for what is expected to be another term on the Board of Education.

Able Feldhamer

Abel Feldhamer

Age: 34 years old
Profession: Private practice attorney
Relationship to District 15: Married with four children, living in Cedarhurst 10 years. Three, soon to be four, children in local private schools. Served one term on board (three years).

Why did you decide to become a board member?
“Prior to joining the school board, I regularly attended the public board meetings, and took an active interest in our school district. With several young children, I have a great interest in ensuring that our schools provide the best possible education. I had always hoped that I could personally contribute my time and energy to help make our schools the best that they could be, so when the opportunity arose to run for the school board, I didn’t hesitate.”

What has been your biggest achievement?
“I was fortunate to join a board which had already accomplished so much over the past several years. The board’s record really speaks for itself. Together with the hard work of the administration, we have recently completed a extensive capital improvement program, expanded many of the district’s services, and continue to maintain a stellar academic program, without imposing an increased burden on our taxpayers. But I would certainly say that our greatest accomplishment has been the installation of our new Superintendent and the various other administrative changes that have been made over the past year.  As stewards of our community’s schools in these challenging times, it is essential that we take a hard and fresh look at everything the district does, and encourage innovation by our administrators at every opportunity. I am proud of the success that our administrators have achieved and their continued accomplishments through out-of-the-box thinking and innovation, especially in light of the challenges of ever increasing government mandates, and the loss of state aid and grants.”

What changes would you like to see in the district over the next term?
“I am excited about many of the new programs that we are currently working on, both within the walls of the public schools, and through alliances with community organizations.  Many of these programs are geared towards students who may be underserved by the district, and some of them towards serving the needs of the broader community. I am anxious to see everyone in the community become greater stakeholders in the school district and our schools through the programs and services that we offer. This, I believe, is the greatest recognition of the school board’s and administration’s hard work and innovation.”

Age: 48
Profession: Real Estate developer
Relationship to District 15: No children in the district.  Two-term board member (six years).

Why did you decide to become a board member?
“To give something back to the community and to insure that we give our kids the best education while carefully watching the public purse.  Service is the highest privilege.”

What has been your biggest achievement?
“Definitely the capital improvement of the school facilities.  My job as a developer involves adaptive reuse of historic buildings.  I know how to perform renovations in a cost effective way.  I spearheaded and managed the $17 million capital improvements project over the last 3-5 years.  We started out with a $30 million budget.  By bringing in the professionals I work with, we brought that down to $16 million (we then added $1 million for the turf football field).    Our engineer later told us that we got more with my $16 million program than we would’ve gotten with the original $30 million program.

We have also seen improvements across a broad spectrum of education goals.  We are now graduating 98.7 percent of our students, an almost unheard of level for a district in which over 60 percent of the kids are on free and reduced price lunch.

Finally, we have kept taxes low.  The annual increase in taxes on my watch has been only .5 percent (i.e. one half of one percent), much lower than the rate of inflation.  The only reason they went up even that much is that we lost so much of our state aid.  One year we cut spending by 1.5 percent but had to raise taxes by 4.5 percent because we lost our state aid.”

“We need to negotiate a new teachers contract.  Other than that, we need to stay the course, delivering quality education while keeping taxes low.”