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NOVEMBER 9-15, 2011
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Special to The Sun
Above, an artist’s rendering of what the South Annex of the Moorestown Friends School will looklike once renovations are completed there in 2012. The annex is located on the school’s Greenleafproperty, which was purchased several years ago. It’s all part of the school’s aggressive, $6 mil-lion capital campaign.
Friends School of the future
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INSIDE THIS ISSUE
Virgin Mary
Iconic Lourdes statue under-going make over.
PAGE 12
PRSRT STDUS POSTAGE
PAID
BELLMAWR, NJ
PERMIT NO. 1239
BY KEVIN CANESSA JR.
The Moorestown Sun
For 20 years, Rich O’Donnellpatrolled the streets of Moorestown, many of whichwere as a sergeant. He was theface of the police department onthe streets, the man who wouldcome to scenes to make sureeverything was in proper order.Now, two years after his retire-ment from the force, O’Donnellhas taken on a completely differ-ent role – as the township’s resi-dency-enforcement officer. Andhis hiring, designed to save tax-payer money (it’s expensive toeducate children these days) bykeeping out-of-district studentsout of local schools, has alreadypaid off.“I started on March 1, andworked last school year throughJune 15,” O’Donnell said. “Inthat short time, we turned in 10students.”While the term “turned in”may seem overly official, what itreally means is those 10 studentsofficially withdrew fromMoorestown schools, and they re-turned to their home districts.This saved the district in morethan $100,000 in tuition, accord-ing to records.At present, parents of stu-dents who are asked to leave thedistrict aren’t charged with anycrime, though they could be inthe future.If a parent believes a child iswrongfully being asked to leavethe district, there’s an appeals’process. Parents would be re-quired to go before a state courtto argue the appeal. Yet in mostcases, O’Donnell says, when anout-of-districter is caught, par-ents generally realize their mis-take and pull the kids out of Moorestown schools.So just why did the school dis-trict decide it was time to takeaction and hire a residency offi-cer?O’Donnell says some on theschool board realized the prob-lem was growing. And, he says,it’s not that school officials didn’timmediately get that there was aproblem with out-of-towners, itsimply wasn’t a priority then – but it is now.“The superintendent and theboard knew there were other pro-grams in other districts like oursnow,” O’Donnell said. “Most of the programs were run by re-tired police officers. When thedistrict realized it was beingoverrun with out-of-district stu-dents, they knew it was time foraction.”And that action was to hireO’Donnell.So just how does he find stu-dents who shouldn’t be in the dis-trict schools?Logically, O’Donnell couldn’treveal too much, so as not to giveaway too many ideas of what helooks for to find the improperly
please see
ADDRESS, page 3
Keeping thepublic schoolsprivate
Rich O’Donnell has been hired as the township’s residency-enforcementofficer to save taxpayer money
BY KEVIN CANESSA JR.
The Moorestown Sun
Moorestown Friends Schoolis one of the oldest three-tieredschools in America (lower, mid-dle and high school all underone roof), having been foundedin 1785. And it’s also been on thesame plot of land longer than just about any other school inthe nation. But with that notioncomes yet another … it’s been along – really long time – sincethe school’s physical plant hasexpanded. In fact, the last timeit expanded, the current head of school was a student there.Richard Nixon was presidentback then. Or was it LBJ?You get the point.But that’s all changing now,thanks to a $6 million capitalcampaign that will bring eightnew modern yet unique class-rooms – and two state-of-the-artscience labs, one of which willhouse the school’s notorious ro-botics lab.The campaign has alreadyraised $5 million, Head of School Larry Van Meter said.And he says he expects the final$1 million to be easily attain-able, thanks to the generosity of family, friends and alumni of the prestigious private Quaker-based school.“We’re very fortunate to havevery generous parents andalumni – and we’re fortunate tohave maintained that relation-ship over the years,” Van Metersaid. “We’re very confidentwe’ll raise the final $1 millionby the close of 2012.”The plant upgrades are hap-pening in two locations. On thecontiguous Greenleaf property,which the school purchased afew years ago, there will beeight new classrooms and a cho-rus room in a converted, 1960sbuilding that was originallyconstructed to be a nursinghome. It will open up close to
Friends School revamp
please see
FRIENDS, page 7
NOVEMBER 9-15, 2011 –THE MOORESTOWN SUN
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enrolled students. But he didoffer some common-sense ideasas to how he’s tipped off.“We checked the list of 40 affi-davit students with relatives inthe district,” O’Donnell said. (Af-fidavit students are those whosefamilies signed affidavits swear-ing a child lives with a relative,not a parent or legal guardian, aminimum of four of the sevendays of the week, thus legally es-tablishing a permanent domicileor residency in the district).“And then there’s returned mail.At times, parents make up ad-dresses that don’t exist – or theysimply don’t live at addressesthey give.”O’Donnell also says he’ll be re-lying on anonymous tips fromthe public to find other violators.More on that in a bit.Now you may be wondering:Why do parents do this in thefirst place? What’s the need forsending a child to a public schoolin another district when, well, allstudents are guaranteed a free,public education in their hometowns?O’Donnell says it’s likely amatter of economics. Parentswant their children to get a bet-ter education in a district with abetter reputation – as is the casein Moorestown – and they simplycannot afford tuition at aCatholic or private school … orthe tuition it would cost to send achild, legally, to an out-of-districtpublic school.“The economic problem ishuge,” said O’Donnell, who in ad-dition to serving on theMoorestown Police Departmentfor two decades also spent a fewyears on Lumberton’s force.The bottom line: saving tax-payers cashO’Donnell wants all residentsto realize the money he will ulti-mately save them as taxpayerswill far outweigh the cost of hisnine-month-a-year salary.“This is an enforcement tool,”O’Donnell said. “It’s meant to bepositive. The cost-savings out-weighs the cost of my investiga-tions.”O’Donnell also wants resi-dents to feel comfortable report-ing potential residency viola-tions. All tips, he says, are strict-ly confidential – no one shouldever feel there would be any sortof repercussions as a result of filing a residency report.“We want residents to feelcomfortable contacting us,” O’-Donnell said. “Everything,everything is confidential.”
Editor’s note: To contact O’- Donnell with a confidential dis-trict residency tip, call him at hisoffice directly at 778-6600, ext.18159 or send him a message by e-mail at
rodonnell@mtps.com
.
Visit us online at www.moorestownsun.com.
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