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4-20-10 'N.J. voters reject school budgets in heated elections '
Star-Ledger. 4-20-10, evening report;
"...New Jersey voters around the state have rejected 138 of 256 school budgets scattered across 10 counties, according to early and unofficial results in statewide school elections..."


N.J. voters reject school budgets in heated elections

By Star-Ledger Staff

April 20, 2010, 11:07PM

New Jersey voters around the state have rejected 138 of 256 school budgets scattered across 10 counties, according to early and unofficial results in statewide school elections.

In the proposed budget he unveiled last month, Gov. Chris Christie slashed $820 million in state aid to school districts and urged voters to defeat budgets if teachers in their schools did not agree to one-year wage freezes, a salvo that igniting a heated debate with the state’s largest teachers union.

In many districts, the governor made himself heard.

In Sparta, where voter turnout rivaled some presidential elections, the budget was defeated by roughly a 3-to-1 margin. Sparta teachers agreed to a one-year wage freeze late last week, but the budget still called for a nearly 10 percent tax increase for residents in the Sussex County community.

"I think the governor’s rhetoric hurt us. The governor dumping all of the state issues on the local level hurt us," Superintendent Thomas Morton said. "It’s going to be a long, hard road. We’ll start to work tomorrow."

In towns where they failed, the budgets will now be presented to the local governing body, which can cut or leave the spending plans as is.

In Sparta, Mayor Scott Seelagy said he wanted to analyze the budget before commenting on where the council would look for cuts.

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How did you vote on your school budget?



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"The voters in Sparta have sent a very strong message about how they feel about taxes," said Seelagy, who said he couldn’t recall the last time a Sparta school budget had failed. "I think people voted with their pocketbooks."

In North Brunswick, where the teachers union also agreed last week to a one-year wage freeze, the budget passed.

"The cooperation, I think that was the difference," Superintendent Brian Zychowski said. "People recognized that everybody was trying to contribute to maintain the educational integrity of the school district."

School elections in New Jersey are usually a low-key event. Voter turnout is typically around 15 percent, and roughly 70 percent of budgets are approved.

Based on early and unofficial returns, 46 percent of the budgets had been approved.

This year was different, with weeks of harsh rhetoric and a bare-knuckles political battle between the governor and the New Jersey Education Association, the state’s largest teachers union.

When it came time to cast ballots, residents like Dru Patel of Parsippany, sided with Christie.
Patel, 45, who cast his ballot at Lake Hiawatha School, said he voted "no" on the district’s $127 million budget because "there was nothing like a salary freeze ... in these tough times.

"At our work place, we have had a salary freeze for two years, and the budget and property taxes keep going up," said Patel, a research scientist at a chemical company.

Don Wheeler, of Linden, also voted against his district’s $102 million budget, which included $78 million to be raised in taxes. The budget failed.

"There is such a thing as belt-tightening and if the educators don’t recognize it, they’re going to," Wheeler said.

But not everyone felt that way.

Anthony Cordasco, 38, of Parsippany, said he voted for the budget to preserve the quality of the schools. "I think our governor was irresponsible in his comment urging people to vote no. Individual communities should take their own local needs into consideration," said Cordasco, vice president of an equity firm.

Clem Gibeault of Roselle Park, a former school board president, said he also voted for his district’s $29.2 budget, which would mean the loss of 58 jobs. The budget failed by two votes, but election officials are going to tabulate provisional ballots today.

"The school system is the only thing they’ve got in Roselle Park, and you’ve got to support it," he said.

By Jeanette Rundquist and Kristen Alloway/The Star-Ledger