Essex board approves new website, sharing admin with Hamburg

Members of the Essex School Board agreed to proceed with rolling out a new website at the Feb. 16 regular meeting. The current website, explained board secretary Melissa Chambers, is outdated and difficult to update and make changes to.
The new website will be in use by March, Chambers added.
Board members also agreed to finally vote on the East Gymnasium project at the March meeting. Discussion on what should be done to the facility and how it should be paid for have been in discussions for several years.
To remodel the entire gymnasium and bring it up to code, the price tag is around $1.4 million. Dr. Mike Wells, Essex superintendent said the board feels they could raise a large portion of that through fundraising and pay the remainder through Penny Sales Tax funds and Physical Plant and Equipment Levy (PPEL) funds.
“If they did the whole project of $1.4 million we would need the community’s support to do that. We would need a small revenue bond,” said Wells.
Wells continued to say the board wants to make an “informed decision” and do what the community wants.
“It doesn’t do us any good to put $1.4 million into a building that people won’t use,” Wells said. “They’ve been very thoughtful in the process; they have surveyed, they’ve had committees and they are to the point where they need to make a decision.”
Wells said as a small district, it can’t be a rushed decision, as there are additional projects where Penny Sales Tax and PPEL funds could be used.
Board members also heard from Essex Mayor Calvin Kinney, who would like to look into sharing a marketing director with the school.
Kinney said there are numerous positives going on in the city and at the school that aren’t being shared. A combined marketing director for the city and school would be greatly beneficial.
“There are too many great things going on in this community that you may know about and everybody here may know about because we’re on the appropriate boards to where we had better know about them, but there are a lot of people that don’t realize how good we are,” said Kinney. “There are a lot of communities that are marketing themselves better, and we need to find someone to help us do the same.”
As it was only a discussion item and because 2022-23 city and school budgets have been finalized, if a marketing position were agreed upon, it wouldn’t most likely begin until 2023. The budget hearing for the 22-23 school budget is set for 6 p.m. March 16.
In other business, the board:
• Hired Lawn World for lawn care for the 2022-23 year.
• Hired Blair DeBolt as speech coach, Ray Liles as head track coach, and Randy Thompson as co-head golf coach for the current year.
• Heard a presentation from Vicki Hume’s fifth grade class, who were national winners in an eSpark online gaming contest.
• Agreed to share an elementary counselor, maintenance director, human resource director, superintendent, and business director with the Hamburg Community School District for the 2022-23 school year.