The Peabody School Committee refused to let the perfect become the enemy of the good Tuesday night, voting 6-1 to endorse the proposed merger of Peabody Vocational High School with the Essex Aggie and North Shore Regional Technical High School.
Peabody's participation — which still requires an affirmative vote from the City Council when it meets next Thursday — is essential to plans for the establishment of a state-of-the-art career training program for North Shore students.
Board member Beverley Ann Griffin Dunne, who cast the lone dissenting vote, expressed concerns about the cost of the new facility and the fact that not every Peabody student desiring to go there would be accepted.
But colleague David McGeney was both passionate and effective in arguing that this is a unique opportunity that the city cannot afford to pass by given the dilapidated state of its existing vocational facilities and the opportunities the new school will afford the more than 200 students expected to attend.
"It's crunch time," McGeney told the board. Indeed, the state has given the proposed district's 17 eligible communities until Dec. 15 to decide whether to take advantage of the 80-percent subsidy it is offering to fund construction of a new, $130-million facility on the Aggie campus in Danvers.
Also arguing in favor of the project was the board's chairman, Mayor Michael Bonfanti, who noted that while Peabody will pay the most towards the construction and operation of the new school, it will reap the most benefit in terms of the number of students it can send there, and have the most clout (almost 25 percent of the weighted vote) on the new regional school committee.
And both McGeney and Bonfanti warned that the state is unlikely to provide any assistance in upgrading the city's existing vocational facilities if it passes up the opportunity to become part of the new district.
Having asked for the School Committee's advice, the City Council should give the project swift approval when it comes before it for a final decision next week.
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