DURHAM- The eight-member committee that will study the pros and cons of Durham pulling out of Regional School Unit 5 had its first chance to meet with residents this week. But it’s already started its work.

Kevin Nadeau, the chairman of the Durham Educational Exploration Committee, said the group has been surveying area school superintendents asking about the capacity of high schools in their district to possibly accommodate Durham students if the decision is made for Durham to leave the RSU it shares with Freeport and Pownal. Nadeau declined to discuss the results of those conversations with the superintendents in advance of the public meeting, scheduled for Monday, Aug. 13, after the Tri-Town Weekly’s deadline.

The committee is charged with looking at Durham’s educational options, including staying in RSU 5 with Freeport and Pownal, joining another regional school unit or becoming a single school district and reverting back to high school choice for its older students.

RSU 5 Superintendent Shannon Welsh said last week that she hasn’t had any conversations with the committee regarding a possible withdrawal by Durham. She said she hoped the town decided to keep the status quo.

“Durham is absolutely an important component of our RSU,” she said, adding that she has had many parents and Durham residents speak to her about the financial benefits that they see to the regional school district.

Nadeau cautioned that the Durham Educational Exploration Committee does not have an agenda of a definite pullout from the RSU.

“Our role is purely a fact-finding one,” he said. “We’re going to put factual information in front of the voters and let them decide.”

As part of the state’s school reorganization law, Durham joined Pownal and Freeport to form RSU 5 in 2009. However, at the beginning of this year, state law allowed for towns to withdraw from RSUs, provided a series of steps was followed.

First, a petition requesting withdrawal must be signed by at least 10 percent of the town’s voters, something that was achieved when more than 250 Durham residents signed a withdrawal petition at the beginning of the year. The question of leaving the district must then be approved by a majority of the town’s voters, and then the selectmen must notify the RSU of the town’s intent to withdraw.

In a previous interview, Nadeau said a date for a vote on a possible RSU withdrawal hasn’t been set yet. He said that the target date for such a vote is the November presidential election, but he wasn’t sure if the question would be on the ballot.

Following that, the town must form a committee to come up with an educational plan that must be approved by the commissioner of the Maine Department of Education.

According to an informational handout distributed by the committee at the meeting on Monday, the ballot question about withdrawing from the RSU would read: “Do you favor filing a petition for withdrawal with the board of directors of Regional School Unit RSU5 and with the Commissioner of Education, authorizing the withdrawal committee to expend (an undermined amount of money) and authorizing the Board of Selectmen to issue notes in the name of Durham, Maine or otherwise pledge the credit of Durham, Maine in an amount not to exceed (an undermined amount of money) for this purpose?”

According to the handout, a yes vote would mean. “You are saying you definitely want to withdraw from RSU 5. It is not a vote for a feasibility study, or for exploring options to see if there is something better out there. It is a definitive vote to withdraw from the RSU.”

If residents vote no on the question, the process stops and Durham would remain in the RSU.

If Durham did withdraw, there would still be a chance that its students could continue to attend Freeport High School. Welsh said that she would be open to discussing an agreement with the town, but made no guarantees.

“It all depends on what’s happening at the high school,” she said. “We’d love to have Durham students continue to work with us, (but) that would all depend on the capacity of the high school.”

Nadeau said that after the meeting this week, the committee would begin to hold weekly committee meetings to go over information and to “start putting meat on the bones of the discussions that we have had.”

Nadeau added that the committee is prepared to answer whatever questions the public has.

“If we hear any new concerns (at the meeting) we’ll go and do our research and digging on those,” he said.