Tom Bartasavage Jr.

Background: I am currently employed by Fegley oil company. I was previously employed by Lehigh Carbon Community College for 16 years. I was Union president for 8 of those years, assistant director of maintenance for 5 years. I was also the co-chair for the environmental health and safety committee for LCCC for 5 years. I was involved in negotiating contracts and creating policies while union president.

Q: If elected, what are our your three priorities?

A: Bullying, promotion of vocational and technical training, and the balancing act of staying fiscally responsible.

Our students are the most important part of this equation. I would like to give them the best bang for the buck while they attend Tamaqua area. Everyone is different we have to learn to respect, understand, and accept each other. This is equally important from the teacher to student perspective as it is from student to student.

Q: What do you think is the best plan to ensure student safety?

A: Keeping the students and staff safe is obviously a very hot topic. I do support policy 705. I support researching all avenues when it comes to securing our buildings and protecting those inside. This also is another fiscal balancing act.

Q: How would you balance the need for fiscal responsibility to the taxpayer with providing a quality education to the students?

A: I am running for Tamaqua Area school board to help move the school in the right direction. I want the opportunity to help our youth graduate with a skill set that will help them achieve their goals and secure them a promising future.

Stacey Betz

Background: I reside in New Ringgold with my husband of 21 years. I am the director of student accounts for Lehigh Carbon Community College and I also teach accounting as an adjunct instructor for LCCC. I hold a B.S. in business administration and accounting and an M.B.A. in community service and economic leadership, both degrees are from Alvernia University.

Q: What are your top three priorities if elected?

A: Making sure that students have a safe and peaceful environment to learn in, ensuring the fiscal aspects of the school district are met with transparency and logic, and lastly, making sure students have everything they need to be successful in the classroom and in their life after high school.

Q: What still needs to be done to ensure student security?

A: I feel very strongly that multiple options for student and staff safety need to be brought to the table. I think this is a decision that not one entity can decide. Ideally, open minds and dialogue with the community, students, staff and faculty where each provide their input will lead us to the best possible way to keep our schools safe, whatever that may be.

Q: How would you balance the need for fiscal responsibility to the taxpayer with providing a quality education to the students?

A: In the current fiscal climate of all educational institutions, tight budgets and doing away with needless spending need to be at the forefront of staying above water. Money needs to be spent where it benefits our students most, period.

Cheryl Tennant Humes

Background: I am a resident of West Penn Township, mother of four and grandmother of three. I’m a proud Tamaqua alumnus, and a graduate of Bloomsburg University and Widener University School of Law. Prior to my current work as property tax attorney, I was a court advocate for children’s best interests and a foster parent for 18 years. I’ve also worked in a public interest law office where I managed employees, volunteers and college interns.

Q: What are your top three priorities if elected?:

A: A top priority is to replace the current security policy with a comprehensive, evidence-based plan. Working with other board members, I will evaluate the district budget and promote fiscally responsible practices. I will encourage transparency in school board decision-making. I pledge to “welcome and encourage active cooperation by citizens, organizations and media” and base decisions on best practices, not on any personal bias, per the Pennsylvania Code of Ethics for School Board Members.

Q: What do you think is the best plan to ensure student security?

A: According to school safety experts, the best plan is multifaceted. I support a strategy that includes safety audits of the buildings; annual safety plans ensuring ease of communications with emergency responders; trained armed resource officers on-site; centralized threat assessment reporting; a focus on prevention by creating a safe school climate; early intervention to detect and prevent potentially violent behavior; and coordination between mental health service providers, police and the district when potential issues are detected.

Q: How would you balance the need for fiscal responsibility to taxpayers, while ensuring a quality education for students?

A: As a property tax attorney, I recognize the challenge of raising necessary revenue in fundamentally fair ways that are not burdensome to homeowners. I recommend a thorough review of the budget for expenses that could be cut with minimal impact to the school’s mission, and methods to increase revenue, including maximizing all grant opportunities.

I will also recommend eliminating the current practice of reverse appeals, which automatically raises taxes on home purchasers in the district.

Jessica Ivey

Background: I currently live and work in the Lewistown Valley on a dairy farm, tending to the calves in addition to milking cows and various farm chores. Previously I worked for fortune 500 companies and other corporate type jobs in my original home of Chester County. With that, I am, admittedly, not Schuylkill County born and raised, but I believe this is where I belong and where I can do the most good.

Q: What are your top three priorities if elected?

A: If elected, my first priority would be to establish safety for our children in an appropriate manner. My other main priorities would be to ensure the community’s voice is heard regarding how we oversee the school and the curriculum and funding we direct in addition to encouraging opportunities for students to find themselves and their passions for a successful future.

Q: What do you think is the best plan to ensure student safety?

A: I believe prevention would be the best plan. Awareness and education not just for school staff but the community itself regarding mental health, family violence, addiction/alcoholism and bullying. As a secondary measure we should have screenings to ensure weapons of any kind do not enter the school.

Q: How would you balance the need for fiscal responsibility to taxpayers, while ensuring a quality education for students?

A: Unfortunately, this is a larger problem which will require a larger answer, in short, I would want to put an end to any possible wasteful spending while providing programs that support students in staff the most.

Liz Pinkey

Background: Born and raised in Hometown, daughter of Kathryn and the late George Pinkey, currently reside in Tamaqua with my husband, Steve Behun, and our three children who are students in the Tamaqua district. I have a BA from Boston University and have been employed by Versum Materials (formerly Air Products) since 1999. I currently work as the data coordinator in the analytical lab. I coach the Tamaqua Blue Waves Swim Team.

Q: What are your top three priorities if elected?

A: My top priorities are improving the educational opportunities for all students to ensure their success post-graduation, ensuring the safety of all students and faculty members, so that their main focus every day can be learning and growing in a secure environment, and to hold the district financially accountable to the taxpayers to be sure that the tax payers and students are all getting their money’s worth from the district.

Q: What do you think is the best plan to ensure student security?

A: The best plan for student security is providing a safe, secure facility, a staff that is well versed in identifying crisis situations and responding to them, and a variety of mental health resources, for faculty and students. In order to be truly effective, any security plan needs the cooperation of the school district, the community, and local law enforcement officers and will need to be modified as the needs of the community change.

Q: How would you balance the need for fiscal responsibility to taxpayers, while ensuring a quality education for students?

A: The taxes in the Tamaqua school district have been steadily increasing, while cuts have been made to the curriculum and staff. Currently, I do not believe that the students are getting the most bang for the educational buck paid for by our taxpayers. We can do better. More pressure needs to be brought to bear on Harrisburg to fund the mandates they hand down and grant opportunities need to be aggressively pursued.

Trina Schellhammer

Background: Trina is a proud mom of two Tamaqua high school students, which she feels is her greatest achievement. She is a lifelong resident of West Penn Township, graduating from Tamaqua in 1988. She has devoted her life to serving her children. She has managed the business office of MAS-TEK Builders Inc., which her husband, Troy, co-owns since 2005. She started her own successful business, The Green Snail, in 2015, creating custom one-of-a-kind memory keepsakes.

Q: What are your top three priorities if elected?

A: Not every student is called to attend a 4-year college, and skilled tradesman are in demand. Partnering with businesses and promoting the benefits of Tamaqua’s Cooperative Education Program and vocational technical training would help to fill these needs.

2. Promote communication with students, parents, and teachers to stay in touch with the needs of our district, and educate them on the reasons behind decisions.

3. Seeking out grants and promoting fiscal responsibility would prevent tax increases.

Q: What do you think is the best plan to ensure student security?:

A: We are reminded daily of the evil in this world, and society today has changed the role of public education. As a parent, ensuring the protection and safety of our children is of utmost importance. I will continue to educate myself on options to ensure our kids are safe, and seek out grant money to help fund this cause. We need to keep all options available to protect our most precious commodity … our children.

Q: How would you balance the need for fiscal responsibility to taxpayers, while ensuring a quality education for students?

A: Our current board has done a wonderful job of working together as a team to make sure that the needs of our students and teachers are met. They have overcome difficult decisions to ensure tax increases do not burden those in our district and worked together to come up with viable solutions to prevent the need of extravagant tax increases. To work together to listen and share views is the key to a successful district.

Justin David Startzel

Background: I was born and raised in Tamaqua, a proud South Warder and a 2009 Tamaqua graduate. I’m employed at Walmart Distribution in Pottsville and an active member of the Pennsylvania Army National Guard as a supply specialist. I was Tamaqua’s first junior borough council member, and was elected to the borough council. I’ve led many successful projects and events promoting both the school and the community and I look forward to building our future together.

Q: What are your top three priorities if elected?

A: One of my priorities is to help create a school where parents can send their children for a quality education in a safe and inclusive environment, and to help build trust between the board, staff, parents and educators.

I will promote policies and strategies that are legal and recommended by experts to make sure each building has adequate security.

I will maintain openness and transparency when conducting school board business.

Q: What do you think is the best plan to ensure student security?

A: Tamaqua Schools can be a place where parents can entrust their children to obtain a quality education in a safe and welcoming environment that is built upon a trusting relationship between staff, educators, administrators, parents and students. It is disheartening we are being forced to speak of the topic of school safety and providing our staff and students with a safe learning environment, but the issues surrounding school safety is real and must be addressed.

Q: How would you balance the need for fiscal responsibility to taxpayers, while ensuring a quality education for students?

A: One of my goals as a school board member is to form a panel of realtors, board members, public officials, and any expert who would be willing to assist me in addressing the issues related to property taxes and assist me in implementing a new process of reassessing property values immediately following the sale of a home or property. Revamping the current tax assessment process would provide an accurate and up-to-date property value assessment.

Karen Tharp

Background: I live in West Penn Township where I live with my husband and have seven children and ten grandchildren. I am a Tamaqua graduate along with degrees in education and counseling psychology.

I served as a special-education teacher for the Schuylkill IU and admissions representative for LCCC. I also was one of the original owners of Climb-a-Lot Clubhouse.

Q: What are your top three priorities if elected?

A: First, I want to rescind Policy 705 which allows for armed teachers and staff. Second, I want to see Tamaqua to implement a full day kindergarten program because it is the only district in the area to not offer one. Third, I want to see an expansion of the district’s dress code.

Additional information about my ideas can be found on the Citizens for Better Schools Facebook page.

Q: What still needs to be done to ensure student security?

A: The best plan to ensure safe schools is to prevent students from becoming violent in the first place. We need threat assessment teams in each building, better mental health services, and anti-bullying programs and training for staff and students. We need to ensure our buildings are secured with locked doors, ID requirements, reconfigured entrances, and metal detector use for both students and visitors.

Q: How would you balance the need for fiscal responsibility to taxpayer with providing a quality education to the students?

A: In the district, I have family on fixed incomes. I don’t want to see taxes go up, so I want to look at additional sources for income. I’d like to see the district hire a grant writer whose pay would be based off of a commission for the awarded grant money. I’d also assess the current budget and look to make cuts, particularly in the areas of administration.

Larry Wittig, Melanie Dillman and Daniel E. Schoener did not respond to the questionnaire.