Board Votes To Move All Students To Cattaraugus

By a 5-2 vote Monday night, the Cattaraugus-Little Valley Board of Education voted to "move all district students to the Cattaraugus campus beginning in September," the Olean Times Herald writes.

The Salamanca Press notes that "critics of the proposal cited a legally nonbinding assurance signed in 1998 by the Cattaraugus school board that promised an elementary building would remain in both communities when Little Valley was annexed." And it adds that:

Richard M. Williams, who said he served as president of the Little Valley School Board when the annexation took place, said he sympathizes with the board’s position in facing difficult decisions but feels a vote to close the Little Valley campus would generate negative votes on any future issue or budget.

"Little Valley as a community would always look toward Cattaraugus with ill feelings for an act that can so easily be avoided," he said about the closure prior to the board’s decision.

Gretchen Taft, a Little Valley resident and director of the Memorial Library of Little Valley, had been a vocal opponent of the proposal and also spoke Monday.

"If you close Little Valley School and dishonor all the people, including me, who worked toward this annexation, then you’re not being honorable," she said.

The two board members who voted against putting all students in Cattaraugus were Kent Joesel and Dave Shinners.

There's no word in the reports about what the district plans to do with the L.V. building.