Print edition highlights July 18, 2024

Northern York County School District

Policies on name, sex and gender under scrutiny

Curt Werner/ Dillsburg Banner

Residents fill the meeting room during the Northern York County School District’s school board meeting Tuesday night.

Mary Lou Bytof/Staff Reporter

As school board mem- bers of the Northern York County School District on Tuesday evening worked to tweak two new policies they developed to keep up with the changing times, District Superintendent Steven Kirkpatrick provided some clarification of the proposed policies. At the end of the meeting, resi- dents voiced their opinions of the second policy.

Policy 123.3 deals with sex-based distinction in athletics, which follows PIAA and Title 9 rulings with a few exceptions. Board Member Greg Hlatky once again voiced his opinion on the section that deviates from the PIAA rules. In the section in question, pre-pubescent boys in Middle School will be permitted to play on a girl’s team. Hlatkey said he is still adamant on following the PIAA ruling.

However, most of the discussion focused on Policy 216.2 regarding the district policy on name, sex and gender identity. Both policies are posted on the district website as attachments under the school board agenda.

The district maintains official records for each student that includes the student’s legal name and sex.

When enrolling a child, the parent/guardian will indicate the sex of that child. A birth certificate is not required at registration. To maintain district policy, such as selection for sports teams, the superintendent may request a copy of a student’s birth certificate to verify the age and sex of the child.

For the rest of the story see the July 25, 2024 edition.

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Organ donors, transplants

One donor can save up to eight lives

Chanty Webb/ Staff Reporter

According to the United Network for Organ Sharing, 103,792 people are in need of an organ transplant at this moment in time. By the end of June 2024, 12,135 organ donors led to 24,261 organ trans- plants. Dillsburg resident Tim Kelly was one of these fortunate recipients.

Kelly and his wife Julia have four children and moved their family to Dillsburg in 2009. “I feel like I lived here my whole entire life. It’s been an awesome community,” Kelly shared. He added that he never planned to hold any type of political position, but ran for Carroll Township supervisor due to his love for the community and a desire to give back. Kelly is four years into a six-year term but has been on leave from his position since the end of May.

As a teen he was diag- nosed with autoimmune hepatitis for which he’s been under a doctor’s care. Twelve years ago during a doctor’s visit, Kelly was diagnosed with stage four cirrhosis. He continued to be monitored and within the last two years his blood tests indicated the presence of liver cancer. Medical staff began bi-monthly scans to look for cancer which was detected in December of 2023. By February Kelly was in Pittsburgh to have the malignancy surgically removed, however, it returned. Due to the critical nature of his condition, he was placed on the trans- plant list which gave him the ability to benefit from a living donor. On May 23, 2024, Kelly’s son Joseph became a living donor for Kelly giving him 60% of the right lobe of his liver. Kelly shared that he was recovering well from this first surgery.

For the rest of the story see the July 25, 2024 edition.

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Washington Township: Trash remains topic of discussion

Washington Township continues to investigate the possibility of having volun- tary trash collection through a bidding process to find an eventual trash hauler. But first, supervisors have to approve a municipal waste ordinance before they can advertise for bids. Work on a draft of that is where the township is right now.

Chair Dan McGregor reported that in informa- tional discussions with Republic Services, he was told that voluntary trash collection with one driver and an automatic trash lift would be cheaper than what residents pay now. Solicitor Other townships have gone to bidding out for trash hauling to prevent dump- ing.

Assuming Washington continues to move forward with this, the next step is to see a preliminary draft ordi- nance, which would then be advertised before final approval. Supervisors indi- cated that any trash service would likely not be effec- tive before the start of 2025. At that point, residents would not be required to sign up for trash hauling, but those choosing to get trash hauling would be required to use the awarded hauler for their trash.

For the rest of the story see the July 25, 2024 edition.

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