Page 4 THE VILLADOM TIMES I • March 2, 2011 FLOW Area District decides not to house autism program by Frank J. McMahon The administration of the Ramapo Indian Hills Regional High School District has decided not to house the Bergen County Special Services Autistic Program at Ramapo High School for the 2011-12 school year. In January, the RIH Board of Education discussed the Bergen County Special Services School District’s proposal to lease facilities at Ramapo High to establish a comprehensive program to provide special education and related services to students classified as autistic. Under that proposal, the BCSSSD would have assumed all responsibility for the program including all facilities improvements, the provision of all special education and related services required for the program, and would have offered placement in the program to the district’s students on a priority basis. The BCSSSD would also have reimbursed the district a per pupil fee for all non-district students enrolled in the program who access any of the other district’s programs or services. RIH Superintendent C. Lauren Schoen recommended that the board enter into a shared services agreement with the BCSSSD to lease the facilities at Ramapo in order to establish the program for 201112, after which time she would determine whether to recommend continuation of the program. Schoen explained that she recommended the program because it would have provided quality services to the district’s students on a continuing basis while also becoming a source of revenue. She also pointed out there is a $30,000 differential in cost per child between housing the program at Ramapo versus placing the district’s autistic children in outside private programs. When that proposal was presented as a resolution, however, trustee Thomas Bunting voiced a concern that the proposal could incur unexpected costs in the future. He said that more dialogue was needed before proceeding to approve the proposal. Trustee Ira Belsky also questioned if locating the program at Ramapo would make the regional school district more attractive to parents of autistic children. “If a couple more autistic children move into the district, that cost could wipe out any revenue from this program,” Belsky said. He explained that it was difficult to balance the benefit of the lower cost per student if the program is housed in the district with the chance that more students might move into the district. Schoen responded that she did not know if the K-12 program would cause more families with autistic children to move into the district, but she emphasized that there are autistic children in the district now and she would prefer to educate them within the district. Trustee Robert Gebhard noted, however, that Ridgewood has such a program, and it has become a magnet for families with autistic children. He said he had been told that many people would look to move into the district if it had this program. Belsky voiced the concern that if that happened in this district there could be a significant cost that would not benefit the district’s other students. Bunting recommended tabling the proposal to study its potential cost and to determine to what extent there would be a change in the population of autistic children in the district if the program were housed at Ramapo High. Schoen agreed to get more information about the impact the program has had on Ridgewood, but at the board’s last public meeting, she advised that given the questions that have been raised and the tight timetable the BCSSSD has for securing a location, the administration decided not to provide a place for the program. 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