The Nominating Committee of the Eastern Section is currently seeking candidates for the school board to fill the vacancy created by the sudden resignation of School Board President Pam Morano, who after struggling with a long period of illness and has been in and out of the hospital, announced her resignation at the March 9 work session, which became effective on March 10. The school board is forced to prepare for its series of upcoming budget meetings beginning March 18 without the leadership of its president and one member short. The ten member Nominating Committee must race to find qualified residents who live east of Franklin Avenue who wish to apply. As a result of the pressing need to find an immediate replacement, resumés or letters of application must be postmarked no later than Monday, March 23 and received no later than noon on March 28.

Pam Morano was described in an article in Garden City Life in the Thursday, April 28, 1994 issue by Michael Maloney as she prepared to join the school board as having "for ten years acted as a watchdog of the school and Village boards." Morano recognized and stated then that, "The physical plant is absolutely the most valuable material asset we have." She saw the conditions of the school district's buildings as needing serious attention and spent the next four years endeavoring to find solutions with her fellow board members and the district's administrators to solve the complex issue of how to improve conditions at the school.

Before she was even sworn in on July 5, 1994, she saw that the population of the district was rising and that space concerns would become a serious problem in the school. She identified the reclaiming of Hemlock as a means of addressing what she described then as "a population explosion." She predicted then that "We may be faced with a crunch for classroom space." With her ability to recognize long-range challenges and the impact of current concerns on the future of the district, she worked tirelessly on the board of education and then became president, leading the district toward creating a Master Plan to address the program needs, population increases, ADA compliance, safety concerns, and maintenance of the facilities. Now, four years later, the Citizens Advisory Committee is working to evaluate the elements of the Capital Improvement Plan, which met with resistance at the polls last November, and to develop a new plan that addresses all of the problems Morano has been working to solve for the last four years.

Chairperson May Conti, Maureen Clancy, Al D'Agostino, Caroline Duncklemann, Walter Engels, John Garvey, Sheila Hoffman, Eileen Murphy, John Pittoni, and Richard Stancs, the ten members of the Nominating Committee, are faced with a tremendous challenge: to find a resident willing to dedicate themselves as wholeheartedly as Pam Morano has during her tenure on the Board of Education, who will help the board address current budgetary issues and help promote the work of the Citizens Adivsory Committee in its attempt to create a new bond that will meet the needs of the students and accommodate the needs of the taxpayers. Anyone interested in applying should send their applications to:

Nominating Committee of the East

Chairperson May Conti

45 Kenwood Road