I first got involved with the New Rochelle school budget when the administration proposed cutting busing to out-of-district private schools in an effort to save money. I was surprised by the need to cut services, when for nine years my wife and I had faithfully voted for tax increases to support a vibrant school system that should never, in our minds, be wanting for funds. While we currently have no children in the public school system, our long term plan has always been for them to attend the high school. So we had “skin in the game” in a number of ways: our desire to live in a great community with thriving schools; our understanding that a weakened school system would drive down property values and lead to flight out of the city; and our longer term intention to take advantage of the fantastic programs at the New Rochelle High School (they have a radio station and a planetarium!). This is also why, several years ago, we campaigned for and voted for the separate line item tax to support our library system and relieve budget pressures on the city.
So earlier this year I attended my first series of School Board meetings and took my first good look at the budget. That’s when I realized that the bus cuts were merely a symptom of underlying budgeting problems. One thing that stood out was the administration was taking raises while teachers’ jobs were being cut. Another item that stood out was the expectation of an unusually large increase in benefit costs. Still, it was tough to get a historical perspective because the budget excluded any history beyond two years.
Then I sat there and watched the budget “process” unfold. For several hours the Superintendent of Business Administration read through the budget, line by line, with no substantive discussion of any of the items. An $80,000 expense received the same amount of attention as a $3 million expense. Questions from the Board were few and far between, and there appeared to be no follow-through on the few questions that warranted further discussion. For example, School Board President Sara Richmond inquired about closing the school buildings earlier in the day to save on energy and personnel costs. Apparently we had done something similar during the early 1990s recession. To this day I’ve heard nothing more about what sounded like a good idea. In my experience, this is not the way an effective Board oversees the creation of a budget.
So I set off to learn more about the budget and the process in an effort to understand why we were suddenly under so much financial strain. I looked on the school’s website for prior year budgets but could find none. I was able to build a partial history from some news accounts that were publicly available, but in order to really understand what was going on I would need to see several years of past budgets. And that’s when the fun began.
In the next segment, I will discuss my early findings and my first interaction with the Administration and the School Board.
Adam D. Egelberg, CFA
This is Big news for all of New Rochelle!
Finally, someone steps up to paint the true picture of how the money is being spent. Thank you Adam. It’s hard to make an informed decision either way on the budget when the ability to analyze it is clouded by ambiguous presentation to the taxpayer (for whatever reason). The strain of carrying the ever mounting tax burden might just be a little more bearable if it is better understood. If discrepencies, misappropriation, or substandard accounting procedures reveal themselves, even better, because the first step in correcting a problem is to identify it. Either way, you are to be commended for the time and effort you are investing in our city. Bring on Part 2!
“And so shines a good deed in a weary world”
adam’s blog
assuming this is just the tip of the iceberg, i look forward to your coming series of analyses…and revelations. as the old song goes: “let the sun shine in…!”
Adam: Bring it on, tell us what you have learned
Citizen’s of New Rochelle really have the right to know what is being done with their hard earned money. We hope you do not mind being placed on Mr. Organisciak “naughty” list.