Merrick meets school board candidates

Merrick residents heard the positions of Board of Education candidates at Meet the Candidates Night on May 3 at Chatterton Elementary School.

Newcomer Maria DiCarlo and incumbents Joann Seibert and Gina Piskin fielded questions from the community and made statements of their own. The community will weigh in at a May 18 public vote.

Seibert, a district parent seeking a third term on the board, played up her financial background and history of PTA involvement at Chatterton. When asked about her meeting attendance over the past three years, Seibert said she's attended every board and PTA meeting in that time, noting earlier in the night that she has been continuously involved in the district since her kids started Chatterton School in 1998. Seibert also said she attended "seven years of very intense budget meetings," beginning with her tenure as PTA co-president and including five years on the Board of Education.

She added that 15 years of professional accounting and finance experience, combined with advanced business degrees and a current position that includes teaching math at Nassau Community College, add to her credentials when budget time rolls around. Seibert supports the 2010-11 proposed school budget "100 percent," pointing out no staff members or programs were cut, despite state aid reductions.

If the budget is voted down, she said places to look for additional cuts may be foreign language, unfunded special education resources, libraries or computers. "This is a decision by seven people and the administration," she said. "As a board member, our first priority is the children," Seibert said, adding that fiscal responsibility and property values are a close second. She said high quality of education in the schools translates to high property values in the community.