On February 21, 2019, a meeting was held at Shawnee High School to give a presentation to the public on upcoming budget concerns due to reductions in state aid. Unfortunately I was unable to attend. However, my friend Michael Carroll was in attendance and has provided the following summary of the meeting. So for the first time, a guest blogger. Thanks Mike for taking the time and writing this up.
State aid to school districts may not be the most exciting
topic, but considering recent events, it is one of the most important issues
facing our town right now – and for years to come. It certainly will be important for anyone who
has kids in either of the local school districts, but it’s also important for
anyone who owns property in town, kids or not.
This issue also crosses the political divide. If you support maintaining current school programming,
funding, and class sizes, then this issue concerns you. If you support lowering property taxes in
Evesham, then this issue concerns you. Any
way you look at it, the recent developments are bad news for Evesham.
For those who want only a brief summary of the issue and the
recent forum about it, you can read “The Short Version” immediately below. For those interested in the full story, please
jump to “The Full Story” further below.
The Short Version
Every year, the State of New Jersey provides funding to local
school districts, including Evesham Township School District and the Lenape
Regional High School District. This state
funding accounts for more than 15% of those two districts’ budgets. Due to an update in the state funding
formula, however, the state is reducing its aid to so-called “overfunded” districts,
and transferring it to other districts it considers to be “underfunded.” Seven districts in the Lenape region are
scheduled to lose more than $24 million. Evesham Township alone will lose more
than $9 million, and Lenape Regional will lose more than $8 million. For Evesham, this represents a more than 60%
reduction in state aid, and a total budget cut of nearly 12%. The cuts started this year, and will be
phased in through the 2024/25 school year, increasing in size each year.
Reductions of that size will put more pressure on local
property taxes to make up the difference, and will require budget cuts
nonetheless. In other words, residents
will be required to pay more for less.
The superintendents of all seven affected districts in the
Lenape region held a forum on Thursday evening (2/21/19) to discuss this issue.
Attendance was reported to be around 400 people. The administrators explained that budget cuts
of this size could lead to staff reductions, increased class sizes, elimination
and/or reduction of academic and extracurricular programs, increased fees,
increased property taxes, and other negative effects. To be clear, no decisions have been made on
how to address the reduced funding – the presentation simply listed possible
outcomes.
To wrap up the evening, the superintendents highlighted the
advocacy efforts already underway, and issued a “call to action” to the
residents of affected districts. More
than 70 school districts—representing more than 150,000 students in 14 counties—have
formed an advocacy group called S.O.S. (Save Our Schools). You can follow their organization on Twitter
(@NJ_SOS), and they asked residents to write to the governor and their
legislators, and attend a rally in Trenton, on March 5th, prior to
Gov. Murphy’s budget address.
The Burlington County Times covered this issue in some
detail last week – its article can be found here: https://www.burlingtoncountytimes.com/news/20190215/school-districts-come-together-to-fight-state-aid-cuts.
The Full Story
Every year, the State of New Jersey provides funding to
local school districts, including Evesham Township School District and the
Lenape Regional High School District.
This state funding accounts for more than 15% of those two districts’
budgets. For the current school year,
Evesham received more than $13 million, and Lenape Regional received more than
$29 million.
Due to an update in the state funding formula, however, the
state is reducing its aid to so-called “overfunded” districts, and transferring
it to other districts it considers to be “underfunded.” Seven districts in the Lenape region are
scheduled to lose more than $24 million. Evesham Township alone will lose more
than $9 million, and Lenape Regional will lose more than $8 million. For Evesham, this represents a more than 60%
reduction in state aid, and a total budget cut of nearly 12%. The cuts started with the 2018/19 school
year, and will phased in through the 2024/25 school year, increasing in size
each year.
A reduction of that size will put more pressure on local
property taxes to make up the difference, and will require budget cuts
nonetheless. In other words, residents
would be required to pay more for less.
On Thursday, February 21st, the superintendents of all seven
affected districts in the Lenape region conducted a Lenape Region State Aid
Reduction Forum at Shawnee High School. This
included John Scavelli, superintendent of the Evesham Township School District,
and Dr. Carol Birnbohm, superintendent of the Lenape Regional High School
District. Attendance was reported to be about
400 people.
The purpose of the forum was to educate residents in
affected districts about the forthcoming cuts and the potential consequences of
those cuts. The administrators also issued a “call to action” to lobby the
governor and legislators to restore the funding. The seven affected school districts in the
Lenape region include Evesham Township and Lenape Regional, along with Medford,
Shamong, Southampton, Tabernacle, and Woodland Township.
The history of how these cuts came about is a bit
complicated, and you can read a full explanation of it here: https://www.njspotlight.com/stories/18/07/25/explainer-everything-you-need-to-know-about-school-funding-in-nj/. The very short version is that this is the
final and long-delayed implementation of a funding reform plan passed in
2008.
According to the forum presentation, the primary metrics
used for the most recent update to the funding formula were (1) student
enrollment, (2) municipal property wealth (i.e., ratables), and (3) personal
wealth of residents. The substantial cut
to Evesham’s aid was a result of all three measures. As most readers may know, enrollment in the Evesham
school district has fallen by nearly 20% since its peak in the 2002/03 school
year. Additionally, both ratables and
the personal wealth of township residents have increased.
Below are the planned cuts for the Lenape region districts (as
reported at the forum), along with the approximate percentage of the total
school budget represented by those cuts (based on my own research). Please note that these numbers will likely be
adjusted, higher or lower, as the
state recalculates the funding each year.
That said, barring significant action the legislature, the administrators
expect the cuts to remain close to these projections.
- Evesham: -$9,003,394 (-11.5%)
- Lenape Regional: -$8,308,946 (-5.1%)
- Medford: -$1,603,435 (-3.1%)
- Shamong: -$1,155,459 (-7.7%)
- Southampton: -$1,141,089 (-8.1%)
- Tabernacle: -$2,752,887 (-18.9%)
- Woodland Twp: -$186,164 (-6.7%)
For Evesham Township School District, the scheduled cuts
look like this:
2018/19:
-$815,227
2019/20: -$689,530
2020/21: -$861,912
2021/22: -$1,206,677
2022/23: -$1,551,442
2023/24: -$1,810,016
2024/25: -$2,068,590
Total:
-$9,003,394
Note that these cuts are cumulative. In other words, for the 2018/19 budget, the
district had to cut expenses (or raise revenue) $815,000. In the 2019/20 budget, it will need to keep
that $815,000 cut, and cut expenses (or raise revenue) another $690,000. Thus, the
cumulative total of $9 million in cuts by 2024/25.
The superintendents emphasized that cuts of this size will have
substantial negative effects on the school districts and their townships. Before turning to those potential
consequences, however, I want to make one thing abundantly clear. No
district has made any long-term decisions on how to address the inevitable
budget shortfall, and the superintendents were not saying that each these
consequences will necessarily come to pass.
The list below simply represents the possibilities given the size of the
scheduled cuts, and the consequences will differ across districts:
- Reduction in staff (teachers, administration, support and custodial staff, etc.)
- Increase in class sizes due to staff reductions
- Elimination/reduction in academic programs
- Reduction in technology resources and text book adoption
- Elimination of some clubs/sports/extracurricular activities
- Increase in activity fees for remaining clubs/sports/extracurricular activities
- Reduction in professional development
- Inability to fund facility improvements / capital projects
- Privatizing busing and elimination of courtesy busing (i.e., busing for kids who live within 2 miles of their school)
- Increase in property tax levy
As part of their presentation, the administrators also
addressed the various revenue-generating and cost-saving measures that have
been introduced over the years. These
include tuition-based services, shared services agreements, employee
contributions to health care, the adoption of low-cost/high-deductible health plans,
joint insurance funds, and other similar measures. Although not expressly stated, the impression
I got from this portion of the presentation was that these kinds of measures
should and will be considered again, but a lot of water has already been drawn
from that well.
To wrap up the evening, the administrators highlighted the
advocacy efforts already underway, and they issued a “call to action” to the
residents of affected districts. More
than 70 school districts—representing more than 150,000 students in 14
counties—have formed an advocacy group called S.O.S. (Save Our Schools). You
can follow that group on Twitter (@NJ_SOS: https://twitter.com/nj_sos),
and they have issued the following summary of the organization and its mission:
Finally, the administrators also asked residents to write to
the governor and their legislators, and to attend a rally in Trenton, on March
5th, prior to Gov. Murphy’s budget address.
For those interested in reading more, the Burlington County Times
covered this issue in some detail last week – the article can be found here: https://www.burlingtoncountytimes.com/news/20190215/school-districts-come-together-to-fight-state-aid-cuts.
Like my Facebook Page to get the latest posts - A View From Evesham. You can email me at MarltonNeil@yahoo.com.