Space An Issue at District's Schools

A space crunch at the School District of the Chathams may soon come to a head at Chatham Middle School.

The middle school is becoming increasingly cramped, and the district would like to initiate work that would allow 81 more seats to be placed in the middle school.

But Gov.-elect Chris Christie, who will take office Tuesday, has stopped the flow of revenue for school construction projects. Because of that, it is unclear whether contracting work that would have created more space within the school will begin anytime soon.

The New Jersey Schools Development Authority honored Christie's request last week.

Since last school year, 203 new children have entered the district, growth which Facilities Committee member Al Burgunder called "significant" at Monday's Board of Education meeting.

In the meantime, the existing space may be rearranged to accomodate more students. In the future, when funding becomes available, the construction work could be done correctly, according to district officials.

"It looked like 81 would be enough for a few years," District Business Administrator Ralph Goodwin said.

But now, district officials said it is possible that even more space might be needed. Officials, however, said they did not want to overreact and create too much additional space, because even though the population seems to be rising now, it tends to go down after a few years of growth.

Board President Roger Rogalin called the space issue one of the board's most significant for the upcoming year. Crafting a fair budget, he said, would also be one of its major challenges.