Everyone was waiting Tuesday night, May 20, after 10 p.m. as the fourth voting machine was being counted. When they read out the numbers, and again the budget passed, the room broke out in clapping.

Dr. Phyllis Harrington, Oyster Bay-East Norwich Superintendent of Schools, smiling, hugged her colleagues.

The budget received 968 yes votes and 655 no votes. The referendum to use existing funds for capital improvements passed with 962 yes votes and 575 no votes. The OB-EN Public Library budget passed with 1,082 yes votes and 467 no votes. Robin Dando received 1,059 votes and Madison Warwick received 963 votes.

Board President James Robinson said, when asked if he was concerned before the vote was tallied said, "Honestly there is always concern but on behalf of the community, this is the smartest choice. But actually I really have not been concerned this year. I think the board spent a lot of time listening to the community and came up with a budget that made sense for the students and the community; and it's obvious that the community supported it."

Nassau County Comptroller Howard Weitzman said in a press release that only 22 percent of the total school spending comes from other sources, primarily school aid from Albany. While Nassau County school districts will pay 72 percent of the cost of education, those in Suffolk County, a few miles away, pay only 62 percent. "Our taxpayers are clearly overburdened," said Mr. Weitzman. "Our representatives in Albany hold the key to correcting that by distributing school aid more equitably to Nassau."

Mr. Robinson said, "What the community needs to understand is that the true tax issues have to be resolved at the state level. We have to make an effort to do something about that. Without that effort nothing will change. All concern here has to be focused at the state level to truly help the community. It's not beneficial to be fighting each other."

Robin Dando won her seat on the board for another four years. When asked if she was worried about winning her seat, she said, "No. I wasn't worried; I knew I had some votes." She ran unopposed but still received 1,059 votes and bested the library board trustee Madison Warwick who received 963 votes, although obviously they were not competing for numbers.

As for the budget, Ms. Dando said, "I'm very happy that the budget passed. We offered an excellent budget. We were able to maintain programs and staff and we worked very hard to bring in a budget that we knew would be fair in these economic times."

As for the inequity in state aid, she said, "Long Island as a whole gets less state aid and Oyster Bay specifically has high property wealth."

Board trustee Keith Kowalsky added, "With our state aid calculated on the average of our property wealth, we get little state aid. If they took the median instead of the average, we'd get a better break and more aid. It is completely unfair. And, we worked very hard to keep the budget low without eliminating things. And this year we signed the teacher's contract and increased their health care contributions and felt it was very fair to both parties."

Dr. Phyllis Harrington said, "I'm incredibly proud of the community and so happy that they have shown their support for our future work here and for the kids we serve.

And thanks go to the board. Tough decisions needed to be made and we made them and now that the community has given us their support we can do our work. It is my responsibility to see that we use those funds in an effective manner. We are working on student achievement and preparing them for a world that is moving ahead fast. We are dealing with their educational and emotional needs in this challenging environment and it is more and more of a challenge. And you need resources to make that happen and we've been doing our best to show that resources are well used."

Mr. Zoeller said, "I'm very gratified that it did so well." He added, "There is a lot of pressure to help the well-off." Residents with large property holdings spoke to the board at several board meetings asking for relief since their taxes are greater because it is based on property values.