Guest Column by Josh Nathan

(PHOTO: Rye resident and former school board president Josh Nathan.)

A lot of people have asked my opinion on the proposed school bond. Here it is: We need to come together as a community, as we’ve done so many times in the past, and support our school system by voting YES, YES, YES on Tuesday.

As taxpayers in Rye we have created one of the best school systems in the nation. Every school day terrific faculty, staff, and administrators, teaching at our four school campuses, meet the diverse learning needs of Rye children in academics, athletics and arts. Partnering with parents, businesses, and nonprofits in the Rye community, our schools ensure that Rye graduates leave well prepared to succeed in college and in life. This is our longstanding tradition in Rye. We support it as Rye taxpayers because education is among our most cherished values.

Now our school campuses need significant work in order to continue to support the phenomenal program we, as a community, have built. And our district professionals and trustees have put forth a responsible and efficient bond to address those needs. The naysayers in our community criticize the bond by offering up flawed and defective logic.

“Why not just do what is absolutely necessary, or even half?” This is a false flag. Schools face the same infrastructure needs that exist throughout our country. There are pressing infrastructure and security needs at each building. And just as importantly, good education is not static. We need to have facilities that support the program that will educate the next generation of Rye graduates to be successful and competitive in this century. Merely patching up buildings that were designed in the 1930s and 50s will quickly leave our children behind. Delaying part or all of the work will set us even further behind, result in parts of some facilities being closed, and ultimately cost us much more.

Many of us will not benefit directly from the bond’s projects in that our children will graduate before the bond’s projects are completed, but our children benefited from capital improvements approved years ago by Rye taxpayers whose children did not benefit directly. I’m grateful to those Rye citizens for their vision and values; now it’s our time to pay it forward to the next generation of Rye families and school children.

As taxpayers we should come together and protect the leading educational system we’ve built for Rye children. Please join me in voting YES, YES, YES this Tuesday, June 11, 2019.

Josh Nathan
Former Rye School Board President, Trustee 2003-2012
June 10, 2019