Residents meet school board candidates

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For Belmont, serving the community in which he lives is an obligation he is proud to do in Lynbrook. “I look forward to working with my fellow board members and the administration to continue fighting to make sure that our children’s education is dictated and controlled by our community and not politicians in Albany and D.C.,” he said.

When asked about school taxes, Hanson said there isn’t much wiggle room for the district because most of the budget goes to paying salaries, benefits, pensions and unfunded mandates, but the board can look to save money in a few different ways, including hiring new vendors when appropriate and cutting clubs that are not well attended.

“Every year the amount of money that you actually have to play with is not a lot,” she said. “What we have to do is continue to look really closely at all our expenses and make sure they’re necessary.”

To help lower school taxes, Kayen said the district could potentially use more electronic devices to cut down on paper costs, share services with neighboring districts when available and enter into a new energy performance contract with Johnson Controls, which was presented to the board last month, to become more energy efficient. If elected, Kayen said he would, “remain available to all in the community and use my resourcefulness to tackle the issues important to all of us.”

Voters will head to the polls on May 21 to select their candidates for school board and decide if the district’s $76.19 million budget, with a tax levy increase of 1.52 percent, passes.

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