Letter to the Editor

Dateline: Feb. 22, 2021

Until today, few people have contacted Allenstown-Alt to dispute or support the news stories about the proposed school bond. One can only surmise that readers either agree with them or are ignoring them. Fair enough.

Long-time resident and former Selectman, Don Chaput, made an unsolicited, surprise phone call with a request to submit his thoughts on the matter, and here they are. You decide whether they are valid.

This letter is for Allenstown voters to encourage them to VOTE NO on School Warrant Articles 1 and 2 of the proposed School Budget. For my part, I served as Selectman from 1980-1985 and also on several town boards.

  1. The town will have to borrow $12,999,824 plus pay back about $325,000 the first year and about $828,625 for the other 19 years. They said that could increase the TAX RATE by an additional $2.77 per thousand.
  2. The land which is mentioned in the warrant article with a purchase price of $450,000 was previously purchased by Northeast for $120,000 and is currently assessed for $159,800.
  3. This is part of the school bond cost but in addition to the OPERATING BUDGET of $11,457,385.
  4. At a time when our student population is about 500 (from page 8 of the Jan. 16 school board handout), and they reported that we are already spending over $20,000 per student, this school bond would place a difficult burden on taxpayers, many of whom are seniors on fixed incomes.
  5. A new school will not entice young families to buy homes if a high tax rate prices them out of the market.
  6. We should instead focus on the necessary repairs and upgrades. With an operating budget of over $11 million, the school board should have had a maintenance person on staff to ensure that problems were identified and repaired either in-house or contracted out as they occurred.
  7. Finally, don't forget that a vote for a new school will also mean continuing to pay the expenses for Allenstown Elementary and Armand Dupont Schools while construction takes place and up to the time when new owners are found for the old schools.

Don Chaput
Allenstown, NH