By NANCY HILER
Oporto seeks her second three-year term, while Corless is looking for her first full, three-year term. She is about to complete the remaining months of the term to which she was elected last May after being appointed in January of 2006.
Each of the four local elementary boards - Bellmore, North Bellmore, Merrick and North Merrick - select two of their trustees every year to serve on the Central High School District Board of Education. All trustees serve without pay.
The school board trustee elections, as well as the two separate elementary school district budget votes, in conjunction with the consolidated Central High School district budget vote, will take place on Tuesday, May 15. The polling places are Newbridge Road School from 1 to 10 p.m. for North Bellmore residents and Shore Road School from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. for Bellmore residents.
Mary Oporto, incumbent
Incumbent Mary Oporto brings three years of Board of Education experience to the table, having served in North Bellmore since 2004, during which she also served as a trustee on the Central High School District board. The position is one among many previous positions that Oporto has held in a long and varied history of service to the schools and community, encompassing some 25 memberships and leadership positions on various committees and organizations.
These include serving as a trustee on the Bellmore-Merrick Central High School Board, as co-president of the Park Avenue and Mepham High School PTAs, treasurer of the Grand Avenue PTA, a charter member of the North Bellmore Special Education PTA and president of the North Bellmore Coordinating Council of PTAs. She also served on the Mepham Site-Based Committee, the Community Wellness Council, and participated in various North Bellmore district committees, including Project SAVE, Professional Development, Crisis Intervention Program, and Report Card committees. She has also served as a volunteer with the Girl Scouts and at her local church.
A resident of North Bellmore for more than 22 years, Oporto and her husband have three college-age children, all of whom went through the North Bellmore Elementary School District and two of three through the local high school district, the last one to do so this year. Oporto holds a bachelor's of business administration in accounting from Adelphi University. She was employed as a senior audit accountant before choosing to stay at home to care for her children.
"I tend to compare and analyze everything," Oporto said, referring to her accounting background. The board's greatest challenge, she said, in the last few years - particularly in light of architects' reports that the school buildings are in need of major repairs - is to examine every cost decision carefully "My accounting background helps us in our conversations with our accountants, and in the auditing process," she explained.
"I don't have a construction background, but it's a question of expenses and ways to spend" when it comes to the facilities issues, she commented. "We have to get the buildings where they should be and maintain them so that no one has to face such a daunting task in the future."
When asked how the schools came to be in such poor condition, she said she thought that a combination of factors may have been in play, including a focus on opening the Martin Avenue School at the time to relieve overcrowding and dwindling state aid, which may have prompted putting things off in hopes that it might have been restored in the future.
By all accounts, the state aid picture in the North Bellmore district has not improved, even this year during what some consider to be a rosy year for Long Island schools. A total of $10 million is earmarked from the state to the district for the 2007-08 school year, just $700,000 over last year's amount. Of that, $145,000 must be spent on pre-Kindergarten, a program that the district does not have, so it does not receive those dollars. Oporto explained that fund accounting is not like regular accounting, but that there are specific rules for earmarking and spending revenue, with which the district must be in compliance.
"My accounting background has helped me to ask questions, to look at things," Oporto said when it comes to examining how best to fund education. "What's frustrating to me is fighting really hard to keep the budget low, but some may not realize this because we need to do a better job communicating that to the public."
"We, as a district, have the most buildings, send the most children to the high school district," Oporto explained. "We try to do the best we can with the resources we have."
By way of example, North Bellmore's per-pupil spending is significantly lower than surrounding districts and toward the lower end across the Island. "I try to look at the business end of things, but children are the focus. I try to find the best ways to save money without hurting the children."
With her children out of the elementary district for years now, and her youngest child graduating this June from Mepham, Oporto says many of her friends ask her why she still wants to serve. "I started getting involved when my youngest was in kindergarten in 1988," she said. "I'm dedicated. I still care about it. North Bellmore has given a lot to my children, and I want to give back." She said she tries to be they type of board member she admired when her children were little. "I try to be the type of board member who is willing to talk to and explain things to parents," she said.
What does she find so rewarding about this non-paying job? "When I see the children at concerts, at graduation, at events like this year's Million Pennies fund-raiser at Martin, that's what puts it all in perspective," she said. "That's where you get to see what you're working so hard for."
Dan DeLilla, challenger
Challenging incumbent Mary Oporto is Dan DeLilla. He also has three years of Board of Education experience, having served North Bellmore from 2000 to 2003. DeLilla was unseated by 30 votes in a three-way election to Howard Pollitt at a time when, he said, "Tempers were high about Mepham and there was a movement at the high school level to get anyone whose term was up off the board." During his tenure, he also served as a trustee on the Central High School board.
In the past, DeLilla served the community as a member of Newbridge Road PTA, Grand Avenue PTA and Mepham PTA, and the North Bellmore and the Central High School Special Education PTAs, including as co-president of the latter. He also served on the Mepham Site-Based Committee, and as a scoutmaster of a local Boy Scout troop.
Both DeLilla and his wife are products of the Central High School District, and have lived in North Bellmore now for 25 years. They have three grown children who graduated from the North Bellmore and Central High School districts. DeLilla is a field contract manager for the Metropolitan Transit Authority in New York City, currently responsible for the procurement for the East Side Access project, which is to bring the LIRR into Grand Central Terminal. His prior experience includes managing public works contracts for the Triborough Bridge & Tunnel Authority and the New York City School Construction Authority. He holds an associate's degree in marketing from Nassau Community College.
DeLilla emphasizes that his professional experience in construction and procurement is important. "We are going into a major capital phase," DeLilla said. "Someone on the board should have the kind of hands-on experience that I have."
When asked why the school buildings were neglected in years past to the point of today's serious disrepair, DeLilla said, "We did things. Roofs, playgrounds, upgraded the electric in all buildings, opened Martin Avenue, and we were heading that way, formulating a plan. Also, it's one man, one vote on the board. I'd like to get a crack at it again," DeLIlla said. "I don't feel I had the opportunity to accomplish all I could have."
"The board was always looking to keep numbers down year to year," he added. "It's a delicate balance. You try to build a pyramid on its head, with a great deal of stuff on the top for the children, their needs, programs and a small number [dollar amount] on the bottom." DeLilla believes that this is the main challenge of being on the board.
Although his children no longer attend local schools, DeLilla said he feels strongly about giving back to the community and serving on the board again. "I very much want to be a part of the new capital program so that gets done properly. If anyone were to ask why, I would say I have the ability and that I have been waiting 18 years to see this work done. I didn't get involved in time for my kids, but I can do something now, and maybe that is something I can leave behind and say I was here."
Another reason for running, he said, is his community spirit. "I'm a legacy, third-generation in the high school district," he said. "This is a great community, and I really care about it and the kids."
He is also motivated by a desire to help children. "On the education side, my children went through the district." He said that he saw how his own children, all of whom had special needs, were well served by the district.
What does he believe to be rewarding about the board position? "When you help the kids, it's a great feeling," he said. "I love to see what the kids can do. Graduation day is pay day."
Rosemarie Corless, unopposed
Rosemarie Corless is running unopposed for her first three-year term with the school board, about to finish out the last year of the term to which she was elected last May and appointed last January.
A strong believer in community service, Corless was vice president of the Newbridge Road School PTA and treasurer of the North Bellmore Educational Foundation, resigning from both positions when she accepted the trustee spot. Previously, she served as the recording secretary and in various committee chairs and other volunteer positions for Newbridge PTA, including spearheading the school's historic 80th birthday celebration in 2004. She is also a Nassau County Girl Scouts leader.
Corless's commitment to children is longstanding. She has been a nurse for more than 20 years, including the last 13 as a pediatric nurse practitioner working with seriously ill children at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center two days a week. Corless holds a master's in parent child health nursing from SUNY-Stony Brook, and a bachelor's in nursing from Adelphi University. Her nursing work also led her to start a foundation to secure wheelchair accessible housing children and to serve on the Board of Directors of Sick Kids Need Involved People and as a committee member for the New York State Games for the Physically Challenged.
She and her firefighter husband have lived in North Bellmore together for 12 years. Her husband grew up in the community and graduated from Mepham High School. They have three young children who attend Newbridge Road School in the district.
"I have spent my life working as an advocate for children," Corless said, "and that motivates me to continue to run for the school board. I also know as a taxpayer myself, especially now that I have been through two budget processes, that it's a challenge trying to balance the needs of the educational process with the needs of the taxpayers."
Corless said she wants parents to remember what is provided to their children. "I think parents and other community members need to know just how much North Bellmore offers its students," she said. "We have great music and art instruction, gifted arts and academic programs, a model prevention program, a newly enriched science curriculum, a successful Spanish pilot, and we are trying to maintain our technology instruction this year, and trying to keep class sizes reasonable."
About the district's facilities issues, Corless said, "That is one of the greatest challenges before the board right now. The buildings have gotten old, and we have to look at them short term, but also long term. We also have to continue to work with our state legislators in trying to increase state aid for Long Island." Corless pointed out that paying for capital projects now is different from when Martin Avenue opened, since the state no longer pays back quickly in the following year, but instead over the useful life of a project. "That can be over 30 years," she said "for such items as roofs, for example."
She said that as part of the building refurbishment process moving forward, she is interested in the health and safety of all of the children in the district. "That expertise in child health is what I bring to the table," she said. "I truly believe my primary role on the board is to be an advocate for children. They don't have a voice, they don't get to vote, and they are our future."
The educational program "is the most important thing, of course," Corless said, "and our district's ongoing strategic planning initiative is looking at how education is delivered and trying to address how to streamline programs and get the most out of them. Educating our children in the most fiscally prudent, cost-efficient way possible," she added, "as taxpayers and as board members, our job is to remember that."
What does Corless find most rewarding? "Watching the children as they go through the grades is very rewarding," she said. "Seeing their progress along the way, and knowing they are receiving a solid foundation, that's what it's all about."
Comments about this story? Nhiler@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 234.
