Even though a final plan is not yet set, the school consolidation effort in the Butler School District is off to a good start. An encouraing tone of reasonableness among parents as well as school officials was evident at Wednesday’s meeting at the Butler Intermediate School. Unlike public meetings in other cities where school closings were being considered, there were no shouting matches or insults.

Despite a few boos from the audience when potentially long bus rides were mentioned, the overall tone of the meeting was respectful and most questions posed by parents were thoughtful. The discussion was well-balanced between potential cost savings and the impact on school children and their education.

Thursday’s front page headline, saying up to seven schools could be closed, was startling. But equally startling was a sentence found halfway through the story — Butler’s overall elementary school occupancy rate is 55 percent. Learning that, most taxpayers in the district have to be wondering why serious conversations about closing half-empty schools did not start years ago. Demographic trends and other factors leading to declining enrollments have been going on for a decade or more.

Last week’s meeting featured a comprehensive review by Thomas and Williamson Program Management of Pittsburgh and several variations of a consolidation plan were presented. And, acknowledging the boos triggered by the possibility of long bus rides, Jon Thomas, company president, said he wants to avoid bus rides as long as 68 minutes, which were predicted in one of the school-closing plans.

With projected annual savings of $5.7 million — in a $100 million budget — some consolidation is needed to make more efficient use of district buildings and cut administrative duplication.

Concerns voiced by parents at the meeting focused mostly on the downside of larger class sizes and longer bus rides. Appropriately, district officials expressed senstivity to those issues and promised to keep focused on children and education, not just cost savings. To his credit, Superintendent Dale Lumley expressed a desire to keep class sizes below industry standards, reminding the audience that district administrators remain sensitive to the impact on education of any consolidation plan.

Looking at the impact on education, it might be worth taking a portion of the savings and investing in things to upgrade the educational experience of children. This could mean restoring, even if only partially, some earlier cuts driven by tight budgets. Such an investment might focus on areas such as technology, music, art or language areas where prior budget cuts were believed to have harmed education.

A retired teacher at the meeting who worked for years at Broad Street Elementary and at the junior high school seemed to capture the general mood when she expressed optimism about the consolidation plans, adding her belief that changes are long overdue. She added the obvious observation that it will be a big change — and for many people change is difficult. Still, it was encouraging to hear optimism and support for the consolidation plan from a former teacher with hands-on experience in a district elementary school and the junior high.

The mood of the 600 people at Wednesday’s meeting was respectful, thoughtful and focused on education, while searching for ways to save money by operating more efficiently.

The school board intends to decide on a plan by December or January, so that changes can be implemented in time for the start of the 2015-16 school year. In the meantime, parents and taxpayers should review the plan options, then voice their thoughts and concerns at public meetings in November and December.