01/31/2026
I hope there are still some old friends who might read this post. While we don't live in Stanford any more, we raised 4 children there who went through the PP Central School system. All had a great experience! And yes, we still care about the community we lived in for 30 years!
Tax Payers of Stanfordville, you have a temporary reprieve with the BOE postponing their decision to close Cold Spring School - that's all. Please show up at every meeting! Get to know the people on the new Advisory Committee who will be charged with studying this "Right sizing". Stanfordville has a huge stake in this. The BOE announcement doesn't mention Stanfordville. In fact it is addressed to the "Pine Plains Community"! I get that from an educator's view point, this is only about how to educate the children, But its more than that. Their decisions will have a long term impact on Stanfordville. Pine Plains will wind up with a school in their community no matter what they decide. I think you all need to fight to keep a school building open in Stanford! Make your concerns known to the new Advisory Committee. Stanford has had a school or schools in town since the 1800's. Out of 9 towns served by PP schools, Stanford pays 34% of the total PP school budget that comes from local taxes. Stanford deserves to have a school in their town and needs it if they are ever going to attract young families in the future. Realtors already suggest to young families on the move to pick a town other than one served by the PP school district because of the reputation, (deserved or not). Seymour is a dinosaur. Cold Spring is way newer with property to expand if needed in the future. I said this 11 years ago to Joe Norton & Martin Handler. At that time enrollment had dropped from almost 1500 down to 1100. (and the cost per student was 30K in those days) The trend was very obvious. So I'll say it again, Stanford (and maybe Pine Plains) should offer substantial tax breaks to attract new young families to purchase homes in town. Phase the tax breaks out over 5 or 10 years. Stanford is about to loose their only school because now enrollment has dropped to about 700. Your fighting for the future of Stanfordville, and your volunteers needed to run everything. Conditions might be much better today if Norton & Handler had made a plan and stuck to it back in those days. I wanted Handler to clean up the school reputation and invite the community and realtors in to show everyone how good it really was, and Norton to offer the tax breaks. (and this can be done) You need young adults with children to move in so the children can fill the school and adults can help run the town, fire dept. rescue , etc.. Just my old fashioned thoughts.
