POLAND — Stephen Hanzely, a retired Youngstown State University professor and Poland resident, spoke at Wednesday’s Poland Board of Education meeting about school vouchers and encouraged district officials to join nearly 300 other Ohio school districts in a Franklin County Common Pleas Court lawsuit to declare vouchers for private schools as unlawful.

“The South Carolina Supreme Court has ruled vouchers as unconstitutional,” Hanzely said.

He sent the school board members and school officials a letter on June 3, 2024, asking Poland to join a lawsuit brought by the Ohio Coalition for Equity and Adequacy of School Funding. The lawsuit is set to be heard on Nov. 4, in Franklin County court.

He said in the Ohio budget bill passed in the spring of 2023, $2 billion was budgeted to cover the cost of vouchers. That bill, according to Hanzely, provided $8,407 a year for high school students and $6,165 for the lower grades.

“In Poland, the vouchers are growing,” Hanzely said. “There used to be around 20 students in private schools, that number is now around 200.”

To join the lawsuit, the Poland Board of Education will have to pass a resolution to join the Ohio Coalition by paying a sum of $2 per district pupil. Of each $2 dues, 50 cents would be allocated for the Coalition’s operating expenses and $1.50 would go toward the effort to challenge the constitutionality of the EdChoice voucher program in Ohio.

“The resolution will be on the agenda for the Oct. 23 regular board meeting,” said Poland Superintendent Craig Hockenberry.

In other business, Treasurer Janet Mutean explained a new meeting setup. In past meetings, the board would go item by item and vote. It often extended the length of the meeting.

“I would be calling the rolls a hundred times in one meeting,” Muntean said.

Under the new system, the board would vote on the treasurer or the superintendent’s entire agenda with one roll call, which is known as a consent agenda. For example, under Wednesday’s superintendent’s consent agenda were 20 separate items. While each item would be read, all 20 could be grouped under one vote.

The new format also would include a vote on the meeting agenda, which allowed for individual items to be moved to the end of the meeting where each could be discussed.

Anyone who had a question or wanted to vote no only on that item could ask that it be pulled out of the respective consent agenda. That would take place during the meeting agenda, which would be approved at the start of the meeting.

Muntean said it would require board members to study the agenda prior to the meeting and state any item they wanted to question or vote no. That item would be pulled out of the consent agendas and placed at the end of the meeting.

Board President Larry Warren recommended giving the new method a chance and if it is not working out, the board can go back to the old method.

Also Wednesday, Dr. Maria Hoffmaster gave a presentation on the federal programs Poland receives. She said the Title I, Title II, Title III, Title IV, IDEA-B, and IDEA Early Childhood funds totaled $189,053.52 for fiscal year 2025. She said the Poland Local School District also serves as fiscal agent for three non-public schools that are receiving $14,457.03 for 2025. The three non-public schools in question are Holy Family, St. Charles, and St. Nicholas. Only Holy Family is located in Poland.