By Doug Miller and Chris munzing
Board of Education President Patrick Gallagher and Trustee Ruth Kaleko are each seeking another three-year term. Mary Lou Monahan, a community activist, is also running.
The election will be held May 17, with polls open from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m.
Residents will also be asked to vote on the school and library budget referendums. The Long Beach City School District has proposed a $97,681,755 budget, with a tax levy that represents an increase of 9.9 percent over the current year. The library's proposed 2005-06 budget of $2,705,220 will also face the voters.
Monahan, an American Airlines official and a civic volunteer, announced she is running on a platform to "raise performance expectations for all students; expand middle school honors classes and high school AP classes; improve eighth-grade math and English scores, close the achievement gap for minority students and offer free SAT prep programs for all high school juniors."
She said she plans to do it by saving tax dollars through partnerships between the schools and the community; by ratcheting up Long Beach's share of federal funding dollars by collecting free lunch applications from every eligible family by making better use of community volunteers and by forcing the teachers' union's hand on health benefits. Long Beach teachers pay a share of their health care benefits that is only about half of what other Nassau County teachers pay.
Kaleko, a trustee for the past nine years, is running for her fourth term. "As a team, with the other board members, we've done remarkably well for Long Beach," she said. "Hiring [Superintendent] Dr. Robert Greenberg was a real find, and giving Long Beach High School Principal Nick Restivo tenure was a great thing."
Having seen it all over the past decade, Kaleko said she has solid plans for the future. "I'm advocating more and more for early childhood development in reading," she said. "I'm pushing for all kindergarten and first-grade classes to have full-time aides to help the children."
She also said she's looking to add more AP courses at the high school and to keep taxes low for the residents of the city.
For the past 11 years, Kaleko has volunteered as a reading tutor for first-graders at Lido Elementary. Before that, she was a teacher in the district for 40 years.
Pat Gallagher, the board's current president, is wrapping up his first three-year term on the board and is running for a second. A former high school principal in Seaford, Gallagher is an adjunct professor of history and government at Nassau Community College and Mercy College, and does curriculum advisory work with Syracuse University.
"My goal is to move students to a higher level of achievement," Gallagher said. "Education moves slowly. Our test scores have gotten better - not great, but better over the last three years - and I think clearly we are on the precipice of making a major move in the middle school in two years and in the high school in four years.
"The changes we've made in the middle school have already begun to pay dividends."
Comments about this story? DMiller@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 213.
