By DONNA KENNY KIRWAN

PAWTUCKET — With a potential $2.5-$3.5 million budget deficit, cuts in state aid, and an uncertain economy that leads to the inevitable arguments over property taxes versus school spending, 10 individuals, including five incumbents, are nevertheless seeking the seven available seats on the Pawtucket School Committee.

Because all 10 of the candidates are running as Democrats, the Sept. 9 primary will be the deciding factor for the upcoming make-up of the School Committee.
Among the incumbents, one of the first to make his candidacy for re-election known was David A. Coughlin. Coughlin, 58, of Armistice Boulevard, is an attorney in a private law practice. First elected to the School Committee in 2006, he said he is seeking re-election because he thinks there is much that should be done to improve the budget process and make both finances and other school-related issues more transparent. “I’m running for the taxpayer,” said Coughlin.
A father of four children —one a college graduate, two in college and one at Tolman High School, Coughlin is fully supportive of the state Auditor General’s recommendation that the School Department undergo a performance audit of school spending. He also advocates a “zero-based” budget approach that is built “from the bottom up, not the top down. “We need to justify how the money is being spent and show the public that these are necessary dollars,” stated Coughlin.
Coughlin has also been critical of what he maintains has been a lack of communication by Schools Supt. Hans Dellith and the Administration to School Committee members on some key issues. Most notably, he said communication was lacking on the all-day kindergarten plan as well as the decision to place students in a lock-down last May due to rumors of gang violence.
Seeking re-election to a third term is 29-year-old Nicole Nordquist, who said her main message is that, “I’m here for the kids of Pawtucket. I fought for the kids for the last four years and I will continue to fight. The children are our city’s future.”
Nordquist, of Mt. Vernon Boulevard, is a former administrative assistant for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Rhode Island, who has recently returned to Rhode Island College to pursue an education degree. She, too, said she supports a performance audit of the school budget, because it would show the city officials as well as the taxpayers just where the money is being spent and how many of the dollars go toward programs and services that are mandated by either the federal or state government.
“It’s easy to say ‘cut the budget,’ but 85 percent of our budget is controlled,” she said. Nordquist maintains that the city needs to provide the schools with more funding to make up for the reduction in state aid, and said her biggest concern is in trying to keep existing programs in place for the students without having to keep cutting from other areas.
Nordquist, who lobbied strongly for full-day kindergarten, said she is pleased that eight out of the 10 schools are able to have the program thanks to federal Title I funding. She said, however, that she would like to see the program expanded to include the two elementary schools that weren’t eligible for Title I, and will make this one of her goals. She also noted that she pushed for School Resource Officers at the two high schools, something also put in place this year.
Amy Breault Zolt, 46, of Potter Street, is seeking a fourth term on the School Committee. As a divorced mother of four boys, three of whom are still in the Pawtucket school system, Zolt said that she considers parental involvement to be crucial to a child’s academic success, and works hard to get that point across to other parents.
“Parents complain about the teachers, but I think the teachers and our schools are very good. The parent needs to care,” Zolt emphasized. “Our schools are open to everybody. If your child gets a “D” on a report card, you need to call the school and find out why. Too many parents don’t do this,” she stated.
Zolt also said she thinks the School Committee and the City Council should “work together instead of against each other.” She maintained that, especially in light of the current fiscal crisis and loss of state aid, the two sides need to have more joint sessions to discuss how the schools should be funded. “We need to be working together. That’s the way it should be,” she stated.
Zolt also said she is running again because she wants to see how some of the new programs and curriculum changes, especially at the high school level, work out in school officials’ quest to decrease drop-out rates.
Joanne M. Bonollo, seeking a second term, has made health and safety issues her priority, as they concern both administrative policies as well as the condition and upkeep of the school buildings. The 50-year-old Grand Avenue resident helped institute wellness guidelines on things like nutrition and overall lifestyle choices, and is currently working to have the topic of teen dating violence addressed as part of the junior high and high school health curricula.
Bonollo has also been involved in matters concerning school building improvements, pushing the administration for repairs and upgrades on leaky roofs, inadequate lighting and other deficiencies. She said she would like to see better communication from the administration as well as an orientation for new school board members.
Bonollo, who works as an accounts receivable specialist for Chex Finer Foods, has four children, two of whom are in high school, and three grandchildren, two of whom are in the city’s school system. “I’ve always been involved in the schools,” she said. Like her fellow incumbents, she also said that she supports a city-financed performance audit that shows where school money is being spent.
Seeking re-election to his third term is David Chellel, a 32-year-old Grosvenor Avenue resident who works as a telecommunications operators for the state’s 911 emergency system. As the parent of a five-year-old daughter who just entered the school system, he is also a strong supporter of having an all-day kindergarten program in place city-wide.
Chellel said that, even after just the first few days, he could see that his daughter was benefiting from the longer instructional time. However, he said he wants to take the program one step further by trying to find a way to have the funding—and for all 10 elementary schools—be part of School Department’s operating budget.
Chellel said he knows the reality of the current economic climate, but is concerned that the federal Title I money being used now to pay for the program could dry up. “It’s also not fair to the two schools that don’t have it,” he said. “I’m not asking to add to the budget. I want to see if we can save enough in cuts to fund the program,” he said.
Chellel also noted that, within the next two years, all three School Department labor contracts will be up. He said he is proud of his record as part of the negotiating team during the last contract sessions, when  employees agreed to pay a portion of their health insurance costs. He said that while he comes from “a big labor family” (his father, J. Thomas Chellel, was president of Council 94 for 26 years), he knows the importance of management “coming to the table with a fair and respectable offer.”
Among the newcomers seeking a seat on the School Committee is Matthew F. Gunnip, a 28-year-old Summit Street resident and 2005 University of Rhode Island graduate who works as a social caseworker in Pawtucket for the state Department of Children, Youth and Families.
Gunnip, also a member of the city’s Juvenile Hearing Board, said he grew up in Coventry but moved to the city in 2005. “I love Pawtucket,” he stated. He said that, as a social worker, he deals with residents who are in difficult situations, which has given him an insight into the need for the city to pay attention to budgetary matters as well as try to improve the educational system.
“I’m for a performance audit of the school budget,” Gunnip stated. “I think we need to make sure that the money is being spent effectively.”
Gunnip said he is particularly concerned about the city’s drop-out rate and thinks more should be done at the 9th grade level to help students realize the various career options that are available. He said that one solution could be to forge a partnership with local post-secondary schools that would help students stay interested in learning at the high school level.
Another first-time candidate is Raymond W. Noonan, an attorney who grew up and was educated in Pawtucket and then left to work in a private practice on the West Coast. He returned in 2005 to be near his 93-year-old father, a former Brown University basketball player who operated Noonan’s Cafe for many years.
“I want to give back,” said Noonan, who said he fondly recalls his days at Pawtucket High School West (now Shea), when he was captain of both the cross-country and track teams. He said that, besides himself, both his parents attended the city’s schools and his mother was a teacher at Jenks Junior High. He said he remembers a time when the city’s schools were considered to be “great” and thinks they can achieve this status once again, while still being fiscally responsible.
Noonan, who lives on Grotto Avenue, said he thinks it is imperative that the School Department find new sources of revenue or grant money, and said his legal training and educational background would be useful along those lines. He also said he is concerned about improving test scores and finding a way to permanently fund the all-day kindergarten program.
Also running is Joseph C. Knight of Lyman Street, a fixture at School Committee meetings and City Council sessions. The 53-year-old retired corrections officer has been a fiscal watchdog and frequent critic of the School Administration, particularly the superintendent. Like Coughlin, he accuses Dellith of sometimes withholding information from the School Committee and of treating the committee’s meeting agenda like his own.
Knight has been crusading for more openness and availability of the minutes of School Committee meetings and executive session decisions, and has filed two complaints with the state Attorney General’s Office charging that the committee violated the state’s Open Meetings Law concerning executive sessions.
To date, the complaints are still under review and no decisions have been rendered. He has also pushed for greater fiscal accountability in the school budget and supports a performance audit.
Knight’s wife, Fran, is a registered nurse who teaches science at Jenks Junior High. He said he sought an informal opinion from the Ethics Commission before seeking a school board seat and was told he was not prohibited because of his wife’s employment. He added, however, that he would recuse himself from any vote that had to do with contract negotiations or other matters involving his wife’s position.
Another new face in local politics is 26-year-old Carlos Tobon. The Bloomingdale Avenue resident attended the city’s schools and has been actively involved in local youth groups and civic organizations. He was part of the area’s first Latino Boy Scout Troop, was twice nominated to the Pawtucket Teen Hall of Fame, and served as both a student volunteer and adult member of the Pawtucket Substance Abuse Prevention Task Force.
Tobon, who is married, works as a real estate investor. He said he wants to give back to a city which he loves, and thinks the best gift to give students is that of a quality education. He also, however, stresses the importance of teaching children at an early age to get involved in community service projects that instill a sense of pride, loyalty, and respect.
Tobon said, “We must comb through the budgets and identify what works and what doesn’t” in an effort to reduce the multi-million dollar school deficit, while “simultaneously complimenting that by scouting out grants for new programs and initiatives to enhance the equipment and facilities that our students use.
Joseph M. Lima, 62, of Seneca Avenue, is a former state representative who served four terms in the General Assembly. His district was downtown Providence, Fox Point and a section of the East Side. He has lived in Pawtucket for the past eight years.
Married, with grown children and grandchildren, Lima said he is running for the school board because he has always been interested in education and, as a legislator, tried to do what he could to help advance it in his district.
Lima said he is particularly interested in maintaining English as a Second Language programs in the city’s schools because he “wants to make sure every kid in the system has an opportunity to learn.” He noted this is especially important to a large school district like Pawtucket, where many of the 9,000-some students are non-English speaking. He also said he would like to see improvements made to the schools’ infrastructure, but thinks this should be done though grant money or other sources. “I’m not about raising taxes. People are paying enough now,” he stated.
Lima noted that he served for eight years on the House Finance Committee and said he thinks his background and knowledge of state government would be helpful in locating federal grant money and other revenue sources that might be available. “I think I can contribute to the school system,” he stated.