By:Jerry Burke
"It hurts me that we had no other option," said St. Boniface's pastor, the Rev. William Gomes. "It especially hurts me for the kids and for the faculty."
The school, which has been open through the administrations of 28 American presidents and 10 popes, has seen its enrollments slip in the past decade. Last June, 220 students were registered. In September the number had dropped to 174.
"The Diocese of Rockville Centre and I have done everything we could to stay open," said Gomes, pointing out that the school had received numerous grants and taken out loans to help make ends meet. "In the end, the diocese made the decision that it would not be viable to stay open."
Gomes says the bottom line was hurt not only by a drop in the number of students, but by an increase in the number of delinquent payments for tuition, which he says averaged $350 a month for a single child, not including a discounted rate for families with a number of students. "Since last year, we have made a concerted effort to alert parents to the fact we could not stay open without collecting the full tuition," said Gomes. "Even with discounting tuition for families who made the effort to work out lower payments, we were in a bind."
While there have been troubling signs for the past few years, Gomes said he spent nearly 200 hours in August trying to work out tuition payments on a family-by-family basis. Last fall, after meeting with the church's finance committee, Gomes and the diocese set a goal to register 264 students for classes starting in Sept. 2004. Otherwise the school would have no other choice but to shut down. As of Monday, only 107 were on board.
Gomes was informed of the diocese's decision on Feb. 5, and notified Principal Kathleen Spollen the next day, shortly before informing the entire faculty. "They were obviously disappointed, but I believe they understood the predicament we were in," said Gomes, who is already helping to place both faculty and students wishing to continue a parochial education in neighboring schools. The school employs just over 20 teachers and staff.
The school, which offered a single class for children in grades Pre-K through 8, has been supported in part by funds from a regional collection of schools, including Our Lady of Lourdes in Malverne, as well as grants by the diocese. "We worked out as many deals as we could with LIPA and Verizon and other utilities," said Gomes. "But now those bills have caught up with us."
The diocese office was contacted for comment but was unavailable to respond before the Herald went to press.
According to the school's Web site, 10 years after the school opened, the Rev. Joseph Hauber was appointed to tend to St. Boniface parish. He invited Dr. Friedrich Wilhelm Germs, the first full-time physician in Foster-s Meadow, to teach in the one-room school to supplement his low income. Germs continued both careers for 25 years.
In 1886, Hauber requested that the Dominican Sisters of Amityville tend to the growing school community. The school continued to grow up until the early 1960s, when its enrollment peaked at 1,200 students.
