JOC braces for likely Lebanon School District withdrawal from CTC

This article was funded by LebTown donors as part of our Civic Impact Reporting Project.

The likely decision by the Lebanon school board to pull out of the Lebanon County Career & Technology Center in favor of building the district’s own vocational center would set renovation plans for the CTC’s 59-year-old building back two years and cost an extra $20 million, joint operating committee members say.

What’s more, the five remaining districts in the CTC would have to pick up $1.38 million in general operating costs otherwise paid by Lebanon, the largest district in the program, according to a chart based on 2026-27 budget numbers, prepared by CTC director Charles Benton. Operating budget costs would increase by $533,044 for the Cornwall-Lebanon district, $362,640 for Palmyra, $260,655 for Eastern Lebanon County, $210,098 for Northern Lebanon, and $169,770 for Annville-Cleona, according to Benton’s chart.

“We’re having some public meetings, some forums in October-November” on the proposal to move Lebanon’s career and technology education in-house, said district board representative Robert Okonak. A decision will likely be made in December.

The Annville-Cleona board is “very disappointed” it is being “held hostage, basically,” said Darren Grumbine, the district’s JOC member.

“When we drive around, we don’t see what’s being said,” Grumbine said. “When we drive through the (Lebanon High School) campus we don’t see what’s being presented as a hardship. We just don’t see it.”

“’How do we approach this to keep this moving?’ That’s how I see us approaching it at Cornwall-Lebanon,” said that school board’s committee member and JOC president Ruth Ann Schlegel. “Presenting it (to the) public in October, having that information to bring that back here for discussion at our October meeting, so we can make some decisions … I’m not sure right now how all districts are going to feel about this with the increase with what these numbers are saying.”

Lebanon’s board needs to make a decision soon to allow the JOC board to hold another vote to finalize the CTC’s first update of its Articles of Agreement in 30 years, said Jean-Pierre Santos, JOC member for the Eastern Lebanon County board. Even a decision by December means a two-year delay in developing renovation plans for the LCCTC’s building, already estimated to be $80 million to $93 million by project architect Beers + Hoffman of Lancaster. By then, renovation will likely cost a minimum of $100 million, he added.

In addition to readjustment of each district’s contribution to the general operating budget, the CTC director’s chart estimates how much each district would pay in five-year debt service of both the $80 million building renovation and $93 million renovation scenarios. These estimates also are delineated by methods of average daily membership (numbers of students), state tax equalization board property valuation (STEB) and “50/50,” weighting ADM and STEB numbers equally.

The Lebanon school board prefers the updated Articles of Agreement to use the STEB method, as the district has the most students attending the LCCTC but has the county’s lowest property values.

Using the $80 million renovation scenario, Cornwall-Lebanon would have a debt service of $1.61 million using ADM, of $1.74 million using 50/50 and of $1.88 million using STEB, if all six districts remain in the CTC. If Lebanon withdraws, Cornwall-Lebanon’s debt service using ADM is $2.03 million.

At the Lebanon school board’s Aug. 17 meeting, district superintendent Nicole Malinowski told the board the district’s schools may be able to educate more career and technical education students internally. LCCTC has 260 student slots available for the city district, which could take up to 600 students in-house and with curriculum better tailored to its students, she said.

Santos told LebTown that the Lebanon School District’s costs to build its own career and technical education school would likely exceed the $530,647 from its 3.4% tax increase for 2026-27 that the district has set aside for the renovation’s debt allocation.

At the JOC’s Aug. 18 meeting, Benton offered a draft proposal that would cap Lebanon’s debt allocation to $670,800 per year and distribute the rest of a 30-year bond cost to the five other districts. The proposal appears not to have swayed the Lebanon board.

In other business, the LCCTC’s drone operation program began its second year this semester, with students offered the opportunity to begin Federal Aviation Administration Part 107 certification for the the Recreational UAS (unmanned aircraft systems) Safety Test, Wednesday, Sept. 16. LCCTC offers drone operation instruction in applied horticulture, criminal justice, and media communications.