As we approach the 2010 school budget season, I am concerned that well-meaning residents will once again play into the hands of proponents of ever-increasing school budgets by chewing up valuable time complaining about the the current union contract (salaries, benefits, pensions, etc.), or federally or state mandated programs (special education, transportation, etc.) or how students these days do not behave like they used to in “the good old days”.
The board just loves having residents dwell on these topics because they have heard them all before and are well practiced in swatting down such remarks — the contract cannot be re-opened unless the union agrees, the law protects union contracts and especially teachers contracts, the board agrees that state and federal mandates should be funded and nothing is going to bring back some mythical past where all students worked hard, dressed properly and treated adults with respect. These topics are all traps and should be avoided.
I would prefer to see residents focus on two main points.
1. It took us years to get out of the current mess and it is going to take years to get out of it. What we need need is coherent, disciplined five-year plan to hold costs at current levels, give the housing market a chance to recover, give inflation time to reduce the real dollar value of spending and take a more aggressive tack with the widespread abused of STAR property tax deductions. As the chart above explains, school budgets have been going up for many years at a steady clip but residents did not feel the pain so long as housing prices went up in tandem with school budgets. Starting in 2006, housing prices began to fall but as the dark blue line on the chart makes clear the district kept on spending as if housing prices were continuing to climb. There is now a $35mm gap between where the budget should be and where it is. Cutting after-school knitting classes or remove a JV soccer coach or canceling field trips to the Norwalk Aquarium is not going to close that $35mm gap.
What New Rochelle needs is a 5 year plan to bring down the bubble gap in stages by (a) holding a line on spending across the board over 5 years to give the housing market time to recover and to let inflation eat away at some of the real dollar value of spending; (b) cease development of any new “luxury” programs like Mandarin CILA or Hebrew Immersion; (c) allow class sizes to rise in conjunction with a 5 year hiring freeze; (d) work with the City tax assessor to investigate illegal STAR exemptions, recoup every dollar and institute the full five year penalty on future STAR for all violators; (e) deal with “wrongly enrolled” student in a firm way — hire a company specializing in enrollment fraud (voter, medicaid, social security, etc.), have them perform a full residency audit, then remove all wrongly enrolled students, seek to recoup funds in the most egregious cases to make examples for others to deter future fraud, and institute a far more rigorous program for investigating “hosted” children; (f) replace John Gallagher as head of buildings and grounds and bring in a new management regime committed to cleaning up the waste, fraud and abuse on that department, starting with removing any locksmiths, glaziers and other providers of non-essential services and drastically cutting back on overtime pay.
Such an approach would recognize the need to pacify unions and PTA moms — no teachers would be fired, no current programs would be eliminated, taxes would not be increased. Revenue would be increased slightly through better STAR enforcement. The budget would benefit from the expected slow bounce back in real estate prices, inflation would eat away at some of the real dollar value of expenses and the bubble gap would begin to close. Having come up with such a plan, the district could then seek to address the remaining bubble gap if still necessary through bonding or tax increases but at a greatly reduced level. The Mandarin program is the most prominent, current example. Like many programs before it, the district gets short-term money from an outside source (grant, the state, etc) which covers a fraction of the cost in the short-term and none of the cost in the long-term and so become just another untouchable program where the district is locked in on teachers and other staff. In fact, this is precisely how the district got into the current financial mess. It is the same principal used by heroin dealers. The first “taste” is free, then they get you hooked, and pretty soon you are willing to do anything for another fix. Likewise, the Italian CILA program began with two grants totalling $75,500 almost all of which has been used to pay for a “bilingual Teaching Assistant. There were 22 kids in the inaugural class; within 2 more years there will be about 90 kids in the program with 4-6 teachers and 2-4 assistants; even if the funding continues it will represent a tiny fraction of the total cost, well over a half-million dollars.
And one last thing. Immediately terminate the person who was supervising Vito Costa, the buildings and grounds worker who was arrested and charged with grand larceny and falsifying business records. Someone over there had to know that Mr. Costa was not showing up for work except on the days when he was coming by to steal air conditioning system supplies.
Unfavorable aspects of February 11 Board of Education meeting
While the Journal News continues to only emphasize positive comments about the Board of Education meeting in their article today, it is unfair to characterize all the comments as favorable. There were favorable comments but also several unfavorable ones, particularly from the southern half of the city, and from several north end speakers who asked for budget cuts in these trying ecomomic times.
Great post Bob and I can’t
Great post Bob and I can’t wait to read how last nights meeting went. And before I forget to mention it, I hope you or someone else with some common sense will run for the school board this year, we need somebody on there who’ll look out for us working stiffs.
While you have great ideas, I think you need to include and focus on the enrollment numbers in the school district. I remember a few years ago hearing that declining enrollments were how the district was going to fund full day K. This would appear to be accurate as the district re-assigned 12 or so teachers to teach full day K. So what are the enrollment numbers now and what are the projections for the next 5 years. If the district is still expecting declines, then they should be able to reduce the number of teachers and support staff. Now wouldn’t it be refreshing to hear our school leaders propose some reductions or dare I say a tax cut? Somehow I think they’re rather tone deaf when it comes to listening to the already over-burdened homeowner/taxpayer so I don’t expect to hear any good news.
Too bad we won’t have a superintendant or board who’ll take the problem head on like in Mamaroneck. At least he’s recognizing the problem and trying to deal with it through cuts to staff/services rather than just tapping the taxpayer well.