At a special Tuesday meeting, the School District of Lancaster board approved a preliminary 2010-2011 budget to be passed onto the Pennsylvania Department of Education. Because of Governor Rendell’s proposed increase for basic education funding, the district may only need to raise property taxes by 6.27%, rather than the 13.97% hike discussed last month.
In January, according to chief financial officer Matt Przywara, the district projected $7.7 million needed to balance the upcoming budget. At the time, only a 2% basic education subsidy expected from the state, Przywara said. Then Rendell’s proposed budget last week offered a 11.46% increase for basic education funding. If this item remains intact, the district would only need $3.4 million for a balanced budget next fiscal year.
Przywara said that, although the state legislature has recently proved rather unpredictable, the district has historically been able to rely on what is proposed by the governor in February. But only time will tell.
New committee talks policy change, progress
Also at the Tuesday evening, the board held its first committee of the whole work session, where board members hope to step back from a fast-paced voting cycle and thoroughly discuss their individual ideas and concerns. In this first meeting alone, the full-board committee mulled over a possible resolution that would significantly alter the role of the board’s education committee.
Proposed by newly-elected member and education committee chair Richard Caplan, this policy change would no longer require the education committee to individually vote on contracts worth less than $25,000. “We are not full-time school administrators,” Caplan explained, “We are part-time volunteers as it were with a very important mission—enormous responsibility. And, for us to exercise that responsibility prudently, it seems to me that we have to focus our attention well.”
Under the proposed change, all contract items would require board approval in the form of a consent agenda, as is currently the case with construction expenditures. The board would retain the right to discuss or vote down particular items of concern—no matter how small.
Caplan noted that, for many contract resolutions, even the most scrupulous committee must generally base its approvals on faith in the administration, which would have already solicited proposals, reviewed candidates, and made a collective recommendation. Superintendent Pedro Rivera noted that, through a formalized process, each contract is reviewed by about ten sets of eyes before it even reaches his desk.
In reducing the time that the education committee spends reviewing contracts, Caplan asserted, more relevant and forward-thinking items could be discussed:
“It will take away probably 80-90% of the contracts that we have to worry about right now and allow us to focus on the issues that we really haven’t brought to the committee….I’ve had the impression…that these meetings are usually driven by the administration. They have the initiative, they bring a program to us at their discretion, and then we respond. I think it should be the other way around.”
New board member Charlie Crystle noted that Caplan’s proposal touches on a discussion that the new board has not yet broached: The varied responsibilities of the board and the administration. Barbara Boben, a member with a continuing term, said that the current “micromanaging” procedure was instituted in reaction the misdeeds of a past administration: “We’ve grown into this because of issues that predated all of us,” she asserted.
Board solicitor Robert Frankenhouser will draft a resolution to change the contract review process for discussion at a later meeting.
Please take note that the school board did not lower or reduce spending. They just changed the amount of money needed from citizens because of an increase in state funds. So we still have a tax and spend school district not making any tough decisions.