KINGFIELD -– The selectmen invited MSAD #58 superintendent Quenten Clark to their regularly scheduled meeting on Monday, Jan. 11. They wanted to hear what may likely be ahead for their town since there’s a projected $78 million cut in state aid to education.

Clark started the meeting by discussing the enrollment figures at the present time. He showed that the entire district had only 51 kindergarteners this year. “Ten or 15 years ago when I first became a factor here, we had over 100 kids in kindergarten year after year,” Clark said.

“Since the beginning of last year’s school year, Mt. Abram had 315 students and we’re now down to 272 which is a pretty substantial drop,” Clark said.

“We’re going to have another substantial drop here shortly. The bottom line is we just don’t have enough kids in the community.”

He also noted they have 55 eighth graders going into high school next year, but 75 seniors will be moving on. That’s another loss of 20 kids just from who’s coming in and who’s going out, he said.

This will inevitably change the way that education is conducted here at MSAD #58. Unless we find a way to get more kids, we’re going to continue to lose subsidy, he explained.

Under the state Essential Program and Services formula, student enrollment plays into a major portion of state subsidy as well as valuation.

Clark went on to explain the sudden rise experienced as a district in valuation. Last year the district was valued at $391,850 and this year it’s valued at $448,400.

“The state mil rate to get our subsidy this year was 6.37 which means that the expected loss of subsidy due to the increase in valuation is $272,318.

Clark said that Maine School Management is predicting that the legislature might increase the mil rate to 7.13 in the future. Along with other means to reduce state spending proposed by the Baldacci administration without “increasing taxes” to balance the budget, the mil rate increase is an additional subsidy loss by another $334,642. The increase in mil rate is a proposal before the lawmakers in Augusta and may or may not happen, Clark explained.

“Just in valuation alone, we could be losing over $600,000.”

Valuation is going to kill us, the number of kids in the schools is in serious decline and that’s going to hurt us, and at the same time that all this is going on, we have to deal with the penalty for not consolidating. With the rise in valuation which calculates the penalty, the loss in revenue may be up to $130,000 to $140,000, he explained.

Clark said he has an upcoming meeting in Augusta and he said he’s fairly optimistic that they’ll somehow find a way to eliminate the penalty. “Either we’ll get rid of it everywhere across the state or we’ll find some kind of magic here.”

Clark explained the “local magic” options that he’s presented to the state, including merging with Coplin and Highland plantations which does not meet the standards of minimal enrollment of the law. An exception would be needed from Legislature, he said. He also described various options such as merging with the unorganized territories.

“The question is, what do we do about this,” Clark asked.

He mentioned that there a number of proposals out there including a conversation he had the week before with concerned Stratton residents. At that meeting, he mentioned a plan to consolidate kids. One plan might be to move middle school kids from Stratton to Kingfield and move elementary Kingfield students to Strong or Phillips.

Kingfield may become a middle school for the entire district. “If you only have 50 to 70 kids in a class and they’re all in one place you’ll only need three teachers… this may allow us to be more efficient in the way we operate.”

Clark also mentioned that down the road they may need to look at the physical condition of Mt. Abram High School “Mt. Abram is 40-plus years old on a design-life that’s good for 50 years.”

Clark said that in five to 10 years they’ll need to decide to close Mt. Abram and rebuild, close and tuition kids out or move the high school to one of the elementary schools. Clark said that the Strong school might best make a high school because the gym is large enough to support high school activities without an expansion.

“We’re just starting to think about these wild ideas on how we can operate more efficiently, because quite frankly time will force us to operate more efficiently. Change is going to have to happen in SAD 58.”

Clark acknowledged how closing a school would affect property values and understood the local importance of keeping schools open in the communities. “The only way that I can figure out how to do that is to consolidate the kids,” he said.

Clark told a story of a senior student who was doing a project on enrollment. He said he figured out when this student started in the district we had 1,105 kids in the district and we now we’re down to 836. “And that’s just the time that one kid has come through our schools. If we do that again it will be a very different picture. By all indications, that’s what we are going to do.”

Clark noted that the 2011/12 fiscal years are going to continue with trouble, with the loss of nearly $100,000 in discontinued federal stimulus money. Also Kingfield’s valuation will jump with an additional $20 million with the addition of Poland Spring’s personal property tax hitting the books that year.

Resident Jack McKee said he would like to see the selectmen hold a public information meeting in the Town of Kingfield so that more residents can be informed of what’s ahead.

That evening, Clark was joined by school board chairman Mike Pond and Kingfield school board directors Judy Dill and Kim Jordan. Clark and the board directors visited the town’s budget committee which was having another meeting in the same building that evening.