Critical Of School Administration–

Council Cuts $1 Million From The Budget

By Kendra Bobowick

Is the “arrogant and short-sighted school administration” to blame for the recent budget failure? During an hourlong discussion Wednesday night, April 25, at a Legislative Council meeting following Tuesday’s failed budget vote, Mitch Bolinsky was just one of many members airing concerns with the administration before entertaining George Ferguson’s motion to reduce education spending by $1 million. His motion carried 10–1.

The town side of the defeated budget still had strong support on the council and was left untouched.

The new overall proposal for the town and education budgets to be presented to voters at a second referendum slated for May 15 is $106,806,523, resulting in a tax rate of 24.6 mills and a 1.28 percent increase over the current budget.

Over and over, council members pondered the significant gap between the Yes and No votes in Tuesday’s referendum — 2,569 No votes were cast and 1,962 Yes votes. The 607-vote difference presented the widest margin for defeating the budget since 2003.

Council members questioned the school superintendent’s position.

Council member Mary Ann Jacob called for a new school superintendent. “Yesterday’s vote was not necessarily a reflection about how people feel about all-day kindergarten; I think it was a reflection of how people feel about the school district in the past year. I don’t think it’s reversible. We need a new superintendent and someone our town has confidence in.”

Mr Bolinsky said, “I thought this was going to be a referendum about full-day kindergarten, but I don’t think that anymore.” He said, “I don’t see Superintendent Janet Robinson here. Shame on you. This isn’t important?”

Speaking to the council Wednesday, finance board member Joseph Kearney said, “This was an angry vote, in my opinion.”

Ms Jacob’s earlier remarks hinted toward a main theme in Wednesday’s conversation. As members wondered why the voters spoke against the budget, talk leaned toward two topics: full-day kindergarten, and frustration with the school administration. As finance board member Carol Walsh would soon point out, one of the main complaints was lack of explanation for the increased education spending in the face of a drop in school enrollment.

Ms Jacob added, “We have to go to the voters again in two weeks. I hope we can get better clarity on the disparity [between] declining enrollment and an increase in the budget.”

Ms Walsh told the council, “Voters have spoken, but we don’t know what they’re saying. I think this was less about full-day kindergarten and more about the administration overall.” She criticized the “lack of specifics” to clarify spending.

Calling the town budget “extraordinary,” Mr Bolinsky said, “I would vote against a motion to touch the municipal budget. We then come to the comments that trouble me.” He said Ms Walsh’s words “read like an indictment against our school administration.”

Ms Jacob shared her reaction. “I would not have thought we would be here tonight talking about cutting $1 million [from education].” Striking out at the school administration, she ran down a list of problems concluding, “This has been one disaster after another for the administration. What I see here is a lack of confidence in the administration. We need leadership that can tell the taxpayers how and why” money is being spent. She characterized the school administration’s performance as “unacceptable.”

Mr Kearney also questioned why enrollment was down, but the budget was up. He also suggested that some “low hanging fruit” for cuts could be the full-day kindergarten. “We’re not talking about merits, but affordability,” he said.

Finance board Chairman John Kortze said the “budget process is long,” then referred to the education budget saying, “We didn’t get the answers we needed.” He questioned why the budget rose despite a drop in enrollment as well. “The public has to understand. It has to be clear. Clearly that’s where we all fell short — I think that was a big part of the issue, not having more information.”

Council member Kathy Fetchick was “surprised at the results of the vote.” She agreed with Legislative Council Chairman Jeff Capeci that conversation in town had been “eerily quiet for months” before the referendum. “In my mind it’s a clear directive that spending is too high,” which is why she agreed with the education reduction.

She also spoke of a “common theme regarding the schools — a lack of credibility in the school system. I have heard that from absolutely everybody.” She feels strongly that the town now has a Board of Education that is “trying to address that,” and “increase confidence in the school system.” She then asked, “Are their efforts being met with push-back [from administrators]? That’s disconcerting.” Ms Fetchick also complained about a lack of explanation from administrators for the increased spending despite enrollment numbers. She didn’t like the lack of response, “and clearly the voters didn’t like it either,” she said.

Several members of the public spoke strongly in favor of the full-day kindergarten, while others suggested that it may be one area to consider for cuts.

Council member Dan Wiedemann had suggested reducing the education spending by an additional $200,000, but his proposal did not win the necessary support.

Council member Paul Lundquist suggested that it would be fair to reduce the education budget in proportion to its percentage of the overall budget — by two-thirds of the million dollars — saying larger cuts would be punitive and a $1 million reduction “is an exaggerated response” to “serious issues” that need to be addressed with the administration. His idea also failed to gain the council’s favor. He was the only council member to vote against Mr Ferguson’s motion to cut school spending by $1 million.

Saying that “necessity is the mother of invention,” finance member Richard Oparowski hopes the school board “can rise to the occasion” and “figure out a way” to make full-day kindergarten work. He believes “staffing of schools needs to be critically reviewed.”

If the budget proposal had passed on the first attempt, it would have generated a 2.34 percent tax increase tied to $107,406,525 in expenditures, while requiring $107,806,525 in revenue. The $400,000 difference was being applied to the fund balance, bringing it up to 8.0 percent of the total budget on July 1, 2012 — one full year ahead of plan.

About one of four of the eligible 4,525 Newtown voters cast ballots in the first round referendum.