MAPLETON — The Mapleton board of education filled its vacancy and elected a new board vice president at its Monday meeting.
The board had a vacancy thanks to the June 23 resignation of its vice president, Tim McKean. McKean cited personal reasons for his resignation after serving on Mapleton’s board of education for nearly eight years, according to previous reporting from the Ashland Source.
On Monday, Vincent Hartzler was put forward to fill the vacancy on the board. He’ll serve out McKean’s term, which ends on Dec. 31.
“Swear him in quick,” one of the members joked after being asked if there was discussion on Hartzler’s approval. The board approved him unanimously.
The board also unanimously voted to appoint Tom Donley its new vice president.
Donley has served on Mapleton’s board of education for a number of years and works at the Cuyahoga Group, according to his bio on Mapleton School District’s website. He’s served as the board’s president and vice president in the past. Donley will not be running for re-election this fall.
The president of the board, Shawn Grundy, also isn’t running for re-election.
The board also approved a resolution for an income tax levy that will be on the ballot in November. The levy, according to the approved language from the board’s agenda, would place a 0.75% income tax on residents in the Mapleton School District.
Should the November levy fail, Mapleton could see a deficit of $44,333 for this year, with the potential to grow to a nearly $484,000 deficit by 2026.
“We need it,” Grundy, the board president, said at the meeting.
But similar efforts by the Mapleton School District to pass such a levy have failed twice now. In May 2022, voters said “no” by 32 percentage points to a five-year 3.2 mills property tax levy that would have generated $500,000 annually for the district.
More recently, a five-year additional 0.75% income tax levy lost by 16 percentage points in this May’s election. That levy would have generated $1,000,000 annually if it had passed.
Discussion also happened about an idea of Grundy’s to re-hang old class photos in the Mapleton Middle School/High School Media Center. The board talked about how the photos of classes from the 1920s to the late 1950s used to hang there, but no longer do.
“I think it does such a pulling together of people,” Grundy said.
He said that as a history “nerd,” he enjoyed seeing the photos — especially the classes between 1941-1944, as he said some of the students in them fought in World War II and died in Europe.
“The first class in there, my dad was in it,” Donley added.
The board went into executive session immediately after the meeting. The next regular board meeting takes place in the Mapleton Middle School/High School Media Center on Aug. 21 at 4:30 p.m.
