The TIMES of Middle Country
Serving CentereaCh
Volume 11, No. 2
•
Selden
•
northern lake grove
April 30, 2015
$1.00
Middle Country BOE adopts budget By BarBara donlon
An evening with Chef Paolo Fontana
also: ‘The Man Who Came to Dinner’ in Northport; Helen Stein Shack Picture Book winners
Page B1
The Middle Country school board unanimously adopted a nearly $236 million budget for the 2015-2016 school year on April 22. The proposed budget will now head to a public vote this May. “This is the first time in 10 years that we’re looking at stabilizing the district,” board President Karen Lessler said prior to the vote. “Ten years we’ve been through a reduction of funding by the state of New York.” The president called the budget “solid,” as it keeps current programs intact, no excessing of staff will happen and it includes a continuation of the popular science, technology, engineering, and mathematics — known as STEM — program that has been a hit in the district. The spending plan is also tax cap compliant. At the district’s budget presentation on April 1, Lessler announced the district would
School board President karen lessler, right, described the proposed budget as “solid.”
receive back roughly 60 percent of the Gap Elimination Adjustment money. The GEA deduction in district aid is currently looking at a loss of $3.3 million,
which is less than years past. “I want to be clear that this is not extra money that we’re getting,” Lessler said at the April 1 meeting. “This is money that
Photo by Barbara Donlon
we’re entitled to have. It has been earmarked in our budget and there has been a reduction in this funding and finally this MIDDLe COUNTRY continued on page a14
Agriculture breeds a culture of kindness Hobbs to hold inaugural run to benefit farm
Pedestrian dies from crash injuries
By Jenni Culkin
Coram woman struck after car drives without headlights
Page a5
File photo
Volunteers help out in the garden at the Bethel Hobbs Community Farm, located on oxhead road in Centereach.
A small Centereach farm, about 11 acres in size, is reaching out to the community to raise the funds necessary to continue doing its good work. The farm has been growing vegetables and other crops to donate to food pantries and people in need since 2007, according to Peter Castorano, one of Bethel Hobbs Community Farm’s caretakers, who lives in the sole house on the property. “Ann started it all,” said Castorano. That Ann is Ann Pellegrino. The Centereach woman discovered the farm, which wasn’t too far from her house, after she sought a place to con-
tinue gardening and donating the crops to the poor. Alfred Hobbs willed the farm to the Bethel AME Church, its owner since 1955. Pellegrino decided to take over the farm’s maintenance, although it is still owned by Bethel Church. She is now the vice president of the farm, which donates tens of thousands of pounds of crops to those in need each year. The farm has recently experienced an invasion by wild deer, which are eating some of the farm’s crops. The deer eating the crops has significantly lowered the overall productivity of the farn. “It costs a lot to maintain the farm,” Pellegrino said. HOBBS continued on page a15