A wise man once said that the way to make a difficult decision
even harder is to take a long time to make it.
A wise man once said that the way to make a difficult decision even harder is to take a long time to make it.
Unfortunately, that seems to be what the Morgan Hill School District school board is doing when it comes to closing the $1.6 million budget gap it faces next year.
Instead of quickly plucking the offending fiscal thorn and minimizing the time we’re feeling the pain, the district is opting to pick at the injury, allowing it to fester and ooze.
In early April trustees eliminated nearly $900,000 in expenses for next year, but still have a staggering $700,000 plus shortfall.
Whenever a cut is suggested – no matter how far away it is from the classroom – someone is ready to protest. Trustees tried and failed to cut their own $240 per month stipend, saving $22,000 that are about as far removed from the classroom as they can be. The motion failed on a 4-2 vote, with Trustee Shellé Thomas saying that returning stipends to the district should be voluntary and taking personal offense at being told she’s “not worth a cent.”
First, the $240 a month stipend is so small that board service is practically voluntary already. Anyone who needs that $240 a month to make school board service valuable or worthwhile probably shouldn’t be on the school board.
Second, no other cuts made to district programs and positions were voluntary, so why should returning the school board stipend be voluntary?
Trustees should set an example of bucking up during difficult times and pass the stipend reduction. It’s not pleasant, but neither is getting a layoff notice. At least the stipend cut won’t impact Morgan Hill classrooms.
Earlier this week, trustees did pass – but not without hand-wringing and protest – a motion to end a subsidy of filing fees for school board candidates. Those opposed to ending the $1,800 per candidate subsidy make dire predictions that only rich candidates or those beholden to specific agendas will run for school board.
Anyone who’s a serious candidate for any office – even school board or city council – is going to need to fundraise. It’s a fact of life in our capitalistic democracy. Any candidate able to garner broad support will be able to mount successful campaigns, and fundraising is a test of a candidate’s ability to appeal to a wide range of the electorate. As for those agendas, let’s not be naive. Anyone passionate and committed enough to run and serve on a school board has an agenda. Ending the candidate filing fee subsidy will have no effect on that.
It’s worth noting that no other school district in the county subsidizes candidate filing fees. If we have 11 candidates for the school board’s four open seats in the upcoming election, the district would be on the hook for nearly $20,000.
Ending the candidate filing fee subsidy allows the district to eliminate a costly, open-ended drain on the general fund for an expense that has no impact on the classroom.
Another “expense” that can be eliminated, at least partially, is actually a lack of ADA, or average daily attendance, funds. The district loses $26 per student per day with excused or unexcused absences. In March, district officials estimated lost ADA would cost the district $600,000. Earlier this month, as officials reviewed seventh-month attendance rates, an increase from the earlier projections was discovered.
A concerted effort, perhaps by increased hours for attendance clerks at the school sites – they were cut last year – or the hiring of a truancy officer to increase attendance would bring in more of a return, in the form of increased ADA funds, than the original investment. Not to mention the fact that students benefit by actually attending school.
Trustees have a June 28 deadline to balance next year’s budget. The deputy superintendent for business services told trustees that they’d see budget-cutting suggestions on every agenda until them. That’s not the way this should be done.
It’s in the best interest of students, teachers, administrators, classified employees, parents and taxpayers to quickly pluck this fiscal thorn. Trustees have seen an extensive list suggested reductions from a task force and they have heard community reaction. It’s time to turn to the difficult task of weighing consequences of each cut, measuring its distance from the classroom, and then reducing expenses until the budget gap is closed.
Someone will be hurt, there’s no getting around it. Someone won’t like the decisions the school board makes. But the community needs to realize that the money has to come from somewhere, and as Trustee Del Foster put it when he argued in support of ending the candidate filing fee, “If not this, then what?”
Trustees need to answer that question now, not drag it out for another two months.
