The Manalapan-Englishtown Regional School District Board of Education is planning to move the district’s administrative offices to the Manalapan Englishtown Middle School (MEMS) on a permanent basis.
The plan to move the administrative offices out of the former Main Street School at 54 Main St., Englishtown, was discussed during the March 17 board meeting held at the Pine Brook School, Manalapan.
Superintendent of Schools John J. Marciante Jr. said the administration building in Englishtown has been beset by a flea infestation for several months. Despite the best efforts of exterminators to eradicate the problem, the situation has not been resolved, he said.
District administrators who were displaced from their offices in Englishtown have been working at MEMS on Millhurst Road, Manalapan.
“I cannot recommend going back to Main Street,” Marciante told board members. “I am recommending an official move to MEMS in some way or another.”
At the present time, plans call for the Englishtown building to be appraised and sold at a public auction, according to the discussion among board members and the superintendent.
Marciante said the board’s attorney is working on the details of the issue. He said MEMS has a capacity of 1,700 pupils and a current enrollment of 1,150 pupils.
“It is very easy for us to make this move. There will be separation of the district’s administrative offices from the students. It (the move) is something of an urgency, not a choice,” he said.
During the business portion of the meeting, board members voted 9-0 to approve the submission of a project application for renovations for school board offices at MEMS to the New Jersey Department of Education for review and department approval.
The board plans to undertake the work as a capital project with no state funding, according to the resolution board members passed. Board members did not say how the work to be completed at MEMS would be funded.
And, board members authorized the firm of Fraytak Veisz Hopkins Duthie, P.C., Trenton, to provide architectural services required for the preparation of plans and documents necessary for the submission of the application to the Department of Education.
The architectural firm will eventually prepare the construction and bid documents in accordance with its proposal and the school district’s long-range facilities plan will be amended to include the project at MEMS, according to the actions taken by the board.
