At the last Herricks school board meeting Herricks Superintendent Dr. Jack Bierwirth said, "Within a week after we announced that we would like to explore an Energy Performance Contract we were approached by a parent, in the district, who said he wanted to help us work out a "deal" with his company, if we could. It has taken a long time and a lot of work. If it had come in earlier we would have incorporated it into the budget, but we never announced it because we didn't know it would happen and we didn't want to jinx it.

"It's a very nice deal and it will be an enormous long-term and short-term benefit to the school district and it will also allow us to modify the budget that was just adopted."

He then turned the meeting over to Herricks director of facilities, James Brown, who has been working on the deal. Brown first said he wanted to introduce the parent who contacted the school and he introduced Brian R. Hassan, lead account executive of major accounts for Long Island Power Authority (LIPA) and KeySpan, who was in the audience.

He said, "Brian and I have been in discussion for the better part of two years and what we have come up with, due to his pushing the various people in his company, is a very good solution."

Brown continued, "We are now going to be capable of burning both oil and gas. KeySpan will be installing larger size gas services in all of our buildings and they will also provide us with the necessary gas piping for all of our boilers. Most of our boilers are now able to run on both oil and gas but there is some gas piping that needs to be done for the boilers. They will be switching the burner for our Shelter Rock Academy so that it can burn both oil and gas.

"However, the 'cherry on this pie' is that they are going to supply us with three 10-ton air conditioning units that we can put into the three elementary school APR rooms. All of that at no cost. We are just obligated to burn gas for the next three years. That being said is a 'no brainer' because gas right now is significantly lower than oil and the projection is that it will be for the next foreseeable future. Oil today was $107 a barrel.

"The total package of what KeySpan National Grid is supplying us with is about $350,000 worth of work and doesn't even include the air conditioners. Therefore, we will present it to the board and, if they approve it tonight, maybe we can get those air-conditioners up and rolling for the summertime."

Brown added, "I should mention that due to the cost of burning gas we will be eligible for KeySpan's rebate program and between our Energy Performance Contract and hopefully the bond gets passed and when we put the new boilers, windows and doors in we will be getting rebates back from KeySpan."

Dr. Bierwirth then asked Brian Hassan if he would like to say anything and he said, "As a parent in the district this is a great opportunity. Bascially, all the buildings in the district now are running on oil and since gas is a lot cheaper the conversion will save money. Because of this, most every big facility on Long Island, such as hospitals and nursing homes are burning gas. The only commitment on the district's part is to burn gas for three years and to not burn oil. After that Jim Brown will have the opportunity, on a month-to-month basis to burn whatever fuel is cheaper at that time. Further, the district can go back and forth between oil and gas whichever is cheaper. The air-conditioning was to try to help out the district. As a resident, this is an opportunity to take advantage of money that is out there."

Board vice-president Richard Buckley mentioned that gas will reduce the carbon footprint and make the district "environmentally friendly."

Prior to the vote Dr. Bierwith said, "This will be a huge savings. In the budget we budgeted $600,000 for oil for the coming year. Further, we have the advantage of being able, after three years, to switch back and forth from gas to oil if the prices come down."

There was an inquiry as to when the work would be done and Hassan said, "I would say that the majority of work will be done this year, if not this summer and probably there will be one or two boilers that are in the bond that are not gas compliant. However, the majority of the work will be done by the end of the year."

Dr. Bierwirth added, "The air conditioners will not be installed until after the students have been dismissed for the summer since they are very large and will have to be installed by cranes and since the crane accident in New York City, we are not taking any chances of having students around."

The board then voted to accept the following proposal: Energy Offer from National Grid-Upgrade to Clean Natural Gas/Transition to Firm Gas Service/Implement Gas Efficiency Improvements.

The following resolution has been prepared for the board's consideration: That upon the recommendation of the superintendent of schools, the board of education hereby accepts a proposal from National Grid/KeySpan, dated March 18, entitled "Energy Offer from National Grid" which includes upgrades to clean natural gas, transition to firm gas service and implementation of gas efficiency improvements, at no cost to the Herricks School Distinct.

Bierwirth said, "There are two ramifications of what you just did. The first is that we have allocated roughly $600,000 for oil for next year and gas is significantly below the cost of oil. We estimate that we will easily save around $200,000, but we are not asking you to reduce the budget by quite that much, just in case the price of gas spikes. We recommend that we take $125,000 out of the budget and reduce the budget by $125,000.

"The second ramification does not require a board resolution. As you remember we had a bond proposal put together and then the recommendation was made that we add air conditioning units at the elementary schools. We came back to the board and asked the board to take that out of the contingency budget. With the offer that is here we can safely take half of that, because we need six units; one for the gym and one for the cafeteria. So, we can take $105,000 in the bond, take it out of the line for the elementary air conditioners and put it back into the contingency. The only thing we need to do is transfer those funds back into the contingency."

This was then followed by the readoption of the 2008-'09 General Fund Budget.

Resolved that the 2008-'09 General Fund Appropriation of $92, 190, 196 as set forth below be adopted subject to voter approval at the May 20 election:

General Support Services	$10,229,922
Instructional Services	55,372,645
Pupil Transportation Services	3,509,103
Community Services	500,191
Undistributed Expenses	22,578,335
	$92,190,196

This budget represents a 5.59 percent increase as opposed to the original budget increase of 5.73 percent.

The board approved all the resolutions proposed.

The balance of the meeting will be included in next week's Illustrated News. The next meeting will be held on April 3, at the Herricks Community Center, 999 Herricks Road, New Hyde Park.