Provided/Terri Nowotny and Steve MahoneyVENTNOR – She has put in the time and is now eligible to retire from public service after 25 years working in local school districts, the last 10 of them in Ventnor.
Ventnor school district Business Administrator Terri Nowotny said that since she completed the required number of years of service and reached retirement age, she is ready to “move on,” she said earlier this week.
The Ventnor City Board of Education advertised for applicants and held a round of interviews but was unable to agree on a permanent replacement. The board will hold a special meeting 4 p.m. Monday, June 10 to appoint an interim business administrator to replace her for a few months until a permanent replacement is found.
Nowotny said there have been a lot of changes since she joined the district 10 years ago. She was hired after the city’s recovery from the effects of Hurricane Sandy.
“We were already in good shape when I got here, but covid was a challenge,” she said.
One of the most challenging issues in the Type I school district over the last decade has been maintaining educational programming amid a declining enrollment. With the assistance of the Board of Commissioners, the city was able to approve the bond ordinances needed to fund HVAC and bathroom improvements to the Ventnor City Educational Community Complex, which houses both an elementary school and a middle school.
“The current board and superintendent have been great to work with and I always liked working in a smaller district,” she said.
Nowotny, 59, who lives in Dennis Township with her longtime boyfriend, Steve Mahoney, was born and raised in Toms River where both of her parents were educators.
She worked at General Electric in Bridgeport, Connecticut, for four years before moving to Cape May County to work as an accountant at Holy Redeemer Health Care. After obtaining her Certified Public Accountant license, she joined the auditing firm of Ford, Scott, Seidenberg and Kennedy. In 1999, she joined the Cape May City school district as business administrator/board secretary, a position she held for nine years. She worked for the Atlantic County Special Services School District and Atlantic County Institute of Technology for four years and then spent two years in the Dennis Township schools before coming to Ventnor.
Like most people, she will enjoy retirement years visiting family and friends and enjoying the things that she found challenging to do during her career.
Terri Nowotny and Steve Mahoney enjoy time at Disney World.
Nowotny enjoys spending time on the golf course, an activity she has pursued for the last 25 years, but Mahoney is a big baseball fan, she said.
“Steve and I are both big Disney fans and Phillies fans,” she said. “I collect Phillies bobbleheads, with a collection of over 100.”
The couple plans to drive west to achieve a longtime goal.
“Our plans are to tour all 30 Major League Baseball stadiums in the U.S. and one in Canada,” she said. “Of course, not all in one year.”
Nowotny said she likes to stay busy with craft projects, cooking and going to the beach, which is something she will have more time to enjoy after she retires June 30.
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