| ||||||||||||
Jim O’Neill, Superintendent TESTIMONY School District of the Chathams School Funding October 17, 2006
Jim O’Neill, Superintendent TESTIMONY
School District of the
973-635-5656
Thank you; I appreciate the opportunity to address the legislators and the public today regarding the pressing issue of school funding. First, I will make a few philosophical statements that I believe need to be weighed as any changes in the school funding formula are considered. Then I will bullet some specific ideas that I believe the legislature should consider so that in the end the formula is fair, the state can fund it, and public schools in
My district is a charter member of the Garden State Coalition of Schools and I want to go on record as supporting the guidelines and principles that organization has articulated and recommended to you as you sort through the thorny issues that surround school funding.
A one-dimensional measurement for success in funding schools will be a disservice to the students, the public and the state. If cost is the only factor that is considered by the legislature we will over time become a state of mediocre school districts. There are many excellent districts in this state and to preserve that excellence I suggest that you cannot arrive at a new method for funding schools unless you also look to quality. I am not sure this is as hard as it would appear. There are close to 600 operating districts in the state, why not identify the middle 50 in terms of cost per pupil. Then look at those same 50 and identify the districts that have performed well by all standardized measures over the last 5 years. Use this number as your goal for funding students and the cost of their education. This is a real number, it gives a benchmark that should work for the great majority of districts and students even if additional money is required to help disadvantaged students enter school ready to learn.
There is a lot of evidence that people have to have an investment of their own resources to be vested in the outcome. Reaching the goal of every community funding its schools to a minimum of 15% and a maximum of 85% insures that goal is met while recognizing that community resources vary significantly. What message does it send students in a community if they can find hundreds of millions of dollars to build an athletic center for professional sports but can only fund their own students education to 5% or less? The other advantage of this is that some income tax money comes back to the community to support the education of your own children. Everyone recognizes there are significant differences in the resources of communities throughout the state. There is, however, reason to question a formula that may have some districts paying 5% or less of their own costs and other communities funding 95% of their own costs.
The problem with most formulas to date is that they do not recognize that some people in more disadvantaged communities could afford a great deal more and many citizens in affluent communities cannot afford what is asked of them. There needs to be a higher degree of fairness in the final formula. This is especially true for senior citizens. Any formula that does not recognize and accommodate the legitimate needs of senior citizens will be a failure. If you cannot find something you believe will work state wide then I recommend that you give municipalities greater latitude to develop programs that meet the needs of their own seniors. Something akin to a reverse mortgage should work. Property taxes are capped when the individual retires but the municipality keeps track of the difference until the owner or the owner’s heirs sell the house. When those uncollected taxes are recouped they would deflate the taxes that need to be raised by everyone else that year. This would have to apply to primary residences not second homes. The end result is that all contribute their fair share just not at the same time. It would recognize this dilemma which annually forces people of good will to go to the polls and decide between the needs of one generation and the needs of another generation.
Please look to do something with the Interim Taxes. I have not seen this discussed anywhere. There has been tremendous development in many of our communities, new homes and new developments. Since the school budget is set at a specific number in April none of the money that comes in from these new developments goes to the schools yet it is collected in the name of schools. This money should go into a special interest bearing account and should decrease school taxes that have to be raised the following year. Now they are raised under the guise of school taxes but they go to municipal projects or reserve accounts and help make municipal tax increases look artificially low. This is blatantly unfair. If the money does not go to schools don’t call it school taxes.
I recognize it is difficult but I believe it would be fair to make an attempt to separate social services from true educational expenses. No one doubts that certain communities present schools with very difficult social issues but these are clearly social not educational expenses. We have no choice but to address the social issue for humanitarian reasons but it is an education that will allow young people to extricate themselves from these circumstances and make a better life for themselves. Many of the dollars that flow to the Abbott districts are for social services; this artificially and unfairly inflates the cost of education.
Why are there no state wide dedicated taxes for schools? We are told to buy lottery tickets to support education but those dollars go into one general account and only go to schools as the legislature determines. If lottery money actually went to schools you may have financial issues elsewhere but education would not be the tax whipping boy it has become.
Every state decides on the testing format that will meet NCLB requirements. We have opted for a fairly rigorous test over multiple days. Then we send 7-10 million dollars to
I know this is moving to another area of the funding issue but the state needs to give districts some tools to help control salaries and health benefits. When the state budget went up 17% 2 years ago it was noted that salaries and benefits were the main cost drivers. Those same things drive our budgets. In all of the rhetoric that criticizes local boards of education and administrators there has not been one piece of legislation that helps us or gives us a tool to deal with these costs. Recently the legislature took away the boards ability to impose the ‘last best offer’. Now we are in protracted negotiations, with expensive legal fees and no end in sight. This legislation was directly contrary to the goal of placing limits on the growth of school budgets. Likewise any attempt to force us all into the state’s health benefits plan will cost many of us millions of dollars because we have negotiated a better deal than you have.
For at least 6 years I have been at meetings when we recommended to the commissioner and his/her staff that they look at another way to resolve conflicts with parents over special education cases and placements. The
There are many examples of unintended consequences coming out of well-intended legislation. I will give you 4 examples:
· Hiring the lowest bidder in construction projects
o This has resulted in hiring sub standard contractors who do lousy work and cost us unanticipated dollars in litigation and remedial work because the work done was to such a poor standard. The lowest responsible contractor would be a better standard.
· 1701 has pushed all of us to spend every dollar every year or our cap will be reduced. There is nothing in that legislation that encourages a district to save money or be prudent. The consequence of being prudent is to reduce your own cap the next year. You are unintentionally punishing districts that are trying to be fiscally responsible.
· When you lowered our cap reserve to 2% you pushed Moody’s to lower our credit rating, which was higher than the states. They knew that due to the law we could not raise our reserve and consequently lowered our rating to the same as the state when previously we were one of 18 districts with credit ratings higher than the state.
· Legal fees as administrative cost. Hiring a lawyer to protect the public’s investment in education, facilities and personnel is often the only way to protect the investment of public funds. There are times it would be irresponsible not to do this but you have tied it to last year’s numbers when it often bears no relationship to last year. Maybe there was no construction last year, maybe no negotiations.
Finally I make these 2 points:
· I personally believe it would be a disaster to hold school board elections in November even though you say they will remain non-partisan. How does that work, 2 candidates for mayor, one supports the school budget, one attacks the school budget. I think we all recognize that becomes partisan very quickly
· There has been a great deal in the papers lately about the reasons people leave
I thank you for your time and this opportunity.
Addendum: I submit the following information but chose not to read it due to time constraints.
· Consolidation in certain cases makes a lot of sense but consolidation is
going to cost some districts a fortune consequently I recommend that we share numbers with communities so they can make an informed decision. Blanket consolidation is going to be at a prohibitive cost for many districts
· High performance in schools does not happen by accident, it is the result of multiple factors. One factor is a knowledgeable individual who is vested in the well being of the students, staff and culture of the school. How is a county bureaucrat who is dealing with hundreds, maybe thousands of openings going to be sure we are sending the right 5th grade teacher to certain school or we are hiring the right science teacher? That individual is only going to be interested in filling empty classroom teaching spots, not the quality of the candidate. I know it is opposite of the emphasis that the legislature has but if you truly wanted to see a change in the 3 state take over districts I believe you would divide those big districts into 10 smaller districts so the superintendent could get to know the teachers and be visible in the community and the schools.
· One of the proposals is to consolidate services at the county level including ‘personnel and curriculum’. In my professional opinion this would be an absolute disaster and ensure the deterioration of school districts. It may be possible to consolidate more factual aspects of central office operations like (e.g. payroll)
· What quality candidates do we anticipate we will attract to these county superintendent positions? Do we expect that principals making more than the county superintendent will apply for these jobs? Do we believe that these jobs will attract large numbers of qualified people?
· The biggest districts in the state are among the most expensive to run on a per pupil cost. What evidence does that give us that bigger is cheaper?
· After the first year when you save all the superintendent salaries what do you do the next year? Now you have large countywide offices with multiple assistants, where is the savings?
