SAD 41 annual budget meeting set for Monday

MILO — Now that the SAD 41 School Board has done its work on the proposed 2025-26 school year budget, the public will have its opportunity to vote on the finances.

The annual budget meeting will start at 6 p.m. on Monday, May 19 at the Penquis Valley School with a 5:30 p.m. information session. The total approved on May 19 will be moved to a referendum vote on Tuesday, June 10 in the SAD 41 communities of Brownville, LaGrange and Milo. The budget and dates were all approved during a May 7 school board meeting.

“For this year we are looking at an overall increase of 5.95 percent,” Business Director Heidi Sisco said.

Last June SAD 41 voters approved an $11,283,254 budget for 2024-25, and a 5.95 percent increase would equal about $671,000.

“We’ve done a lot of work and I really liked the process we used this year,” Superintendent Darcie Fournier said. “We utilized our board finance committee to support prioritizing our needs and to help create an efficient and effective budget to present tonight.”

In other business, Fournier said she has been working with the Maine Department of Education on planned programming at the Marion C. Cook School in LaGrange for the district’s youngest students.

“We are well on our way to getting Marion C. Cook School reopened as a school for next year to host our pre-K 3- to 5-year old program,” she said. “We are really excited to get started on this process,” with more details to be worked out.  When asked the superintendent said the program would be open to special needs students in this age group.

MDOE representatives toured both SAD 41’s current pre-K classroom at Milo Elementary and the future home at the Marion C. Cook School with one being “ecstatic about the facilities that we have to offer for our pre-K program,” Fournier said.

Final approval from the MDOE should come in July. SAD 41 has been approved to take part in a cohort pilot program which offers the district the opportunity to apply for grant funds in order to expand programming to pay for renovations to meet code code to serve young students.

The 60-year-old Milo Elementary building does not have the capacity for more students or additional programs, 

State law requires Maine school districts to offer educational services to all children ages 3-5 by September 2027.

Penquis Valley School Principal John Dow reported the annual Day of Service was held the day prior. Middle school students stayed on campus while high school students went out in the SAD 41 community to give back.

“I couldn’t be more proud of them,” he said, mentioning Three Rivers Kiwanis provided red vests for the high school students to wear.

“The Day of Service was amazing,” Board Chair MaryLynn Kazyaka said. She said she walked around Milo and saw students raking the historical society lawn and others cleaning up the school campus.

“The kids were everywhere working and it was really nice to see,” Kazyaka said.  

Brownville Elementary School Principal Carol Smith said earlier in the day fourth-graders released the fish they raised with the Piscataquis County Soil and Water Conservation District through the “Trout in the Classroom” program into the Piscataquis River in Dover-Foxcroft. The program also had trout raised at SeDoMoCha Elementary School in Dover-Foxcroft.

Earlier this year the PCSWCD set up tanks in the school with the first lesson teaching students about river habitat, what can be found in these bodies of water and how living things are connected. 

The fourth-graders watched the trout grow from eggs over a few months before the fish were released.

“It’s programs like this that are really beneficial to our students,” Smith said.

Board member Molly Barker gave an update on the Tri-County Technical Center, She said a home in Dexter being constructed by Building Trades students is on track to be completed in the near future.

“It’s already under contract to be sold at the end of May, which is amazing,” Barker said.

With help from various community partners, these students are applying what they have learned in the classroom in the real world as part of a crew to construct a family home on Main Street Hill. The approximately 1,800-square foot house will be put on the market and become someone’s home, standing as a reminder of the students’ time, talents and hard work.