Justin Murphy

@citizenmurphy

SPENCERPORT – Two of the first speakers at a meeting Tuesday about potentially adopting the Urban-Suburban program showed the wide divide in opinions among residents.

The first was Umberto Gigliotti, 87, who declared he'd stop paying taxes if Rochester students are bused in through the program.

"(The district) is for people who live in Spencerport and nowhere else," he said. "Anyone who wants to go to school in Spencerport should buy a house in Spencerport."

Andreatta: Who is Spencerport to shun Urban-Suburban?

Rochester students' problem, he said, is that they don't want to learn. He got a standing ovation.

He was followed shortly by Cara Montrois, a Spencerport resident and teacher at Wheatland-Chili High School, where the Urban-Suburban program is already in place. The Rochester students she teaches are as bright, hard-working and dedicated as those who live in the district, she said.

"I'm sort of embarrassed our community has been so unwelcoming," she said. "We're someplace special. We're better than this."

Several hundred people filled the high school auditorium for the second public hearing on Superintendent Michael Crumb's recommendation that the district become the eighth district in Monroe County to voluntarily accept minority Rochester students.

They agreed on one thing: Spencerport is a special place. The question was whether that specialness should be protected or shared.

Some opponents — from the applause, they seemed to be a majority — said the district already has enough problems with academic performance and drugs without accepting city kids. One young alumna declared she'd never let her kids go to Spencerport schools if Urban-Suburban is put in place.

Several speakers said they didn't believe Spencerport stands to benefit from the program; Jeremy and Rachel Ouimet cringed. He is white, she is black, and they have six children in Spencerport schools, three together and three from previous relationships.

"When we found out Spencerport was considering this, we were excited," Rachel Ouimet said. "We didn't think there'd be any pushback whatsoever. … This may be ignorant, but I thought the community had gotten past that. But when you hear the racism, you realize how segregated our schools really are."

There were several questions about funding. State per-pupil funding follows students from Rochester to the new district. The seven participating districts reported their reimbursement exceeds their expenses, according to a fact sheet distributed by the district.

Crumb said Tuesday the district would not increase class sizes to accommodate new students. His recommendation of the number of Urban-Suburban students changed Tuesday, decreasing the target maximum capacity from about 120 to about 72.

A vote was originally scheduled for Tuesday but was postponed due to the intense public interest. Another public forum will be held in January or February, before a vote.

JMURPHY7@DemocratandChronicle.com

Twitter.com/CitizenMurphy