Editorial: Montgomery County schools
Fantasy-based budgeting
The Montgomery County School Board uses noble intentions to justify a delusional spending plan.
The Montgomery County School Board on Tuesday decided to ask the county board of supervisors for more money. School board members want to give raises to school workers and preserve 16 positions that will be cut with the end of federal stimulus aid. Some people would call that bold, inspired and forward-thinking leadership. Others would go with crazy, pandering and futile.
We choose “all of the above.”
February 9, 2012 - 12:09 AM
To say the School Board is looking “greedy” or “foolish” is simply foolish in itself. The Montgomery County Boards of Supervisors, going back for a couple of decades, are simply learning the meaning of the phrase “pay me now, or pay me later.”
The School system is now asking for what it needs. In past years, the Supervisors have only wanted to ask the taxpayers for what was needed, as well – or less. An extra 1 cent per year, for the past 20 years would have been unnoticable to virtually every taxpayer in the county, yet you’ve the short sighted leadership of a few that would prefer to ‘live on the edge’ than show any form of fiscal financial responsibility in building reserves that they knew would eventually be needed.
Lousy leadership like the past Joe Stewart era, the old man who slept through most meetings until the word “tax” was his internal alarm clock that would wake him up, to do nothing more than blurt out “NO” and go back to sleep, and the recent lack of fiscal short sightedness by the likes of Gary Creed, among others (but his position is simply blind to any rational thought) are what have created this mess that the County now faces.
Pay me now, or pay me later. It is later. Don’t blame the School Board, present or past, or call them greedy or foolish. It isn’t their problem. They didn’t make the mess.
Gary Creed is chastised in the previous comment. On the contrary, Creed has tried unsuccessfully to hold the school board accountable for spending. Here’s just one example of the thoughtless spending by the board: every new building receives all new furniture and equipment. Surely there was much from the old BHS which could have been saved for the new building. Just a couple months ago they were asking for $500,000 BEYOND their operating budget for new furniture when they move administration from Junkin Street to a new location. Aside from misspending tax dollars, try to find out at the MCPS website just what we’re getting for our money in the way of a quality education. Their website should have a clear listing of cost/pupil along with student performance assessments. Just check out the NAEP (i.e. Nation’s Report Card) scores to see the condition of education in Virginia e.g. for VA 8th graders the proficiencies for math and reading were 40% and 36% ,respectively.
Back when Harold Dodge was the school superintendent, the county supervisors issued the usual edict that money was tight and all county departments had to keep their budget request at some small percentage of the current year’s buget or cut it by some percentage. Dr. Dodge ignored the request, stating that per the Code of Virginia, he as superintendent was directed to prepare a budget that stated the amount of money that was needed for the support of the school division. That didn’t sit too well with the supervisors, but Dr. Dodge was correct. That part of the Code still stands, see ยง 22.1-92. Estimate of moneys needed for public schools (http://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?000+cod+22.1-92 or http://bit.ly/w9brXD). All the current board is doing is complying with the Code — the school system needs funds to pay teachers a reasonable wage, to replace buses, to fill needed positions. As one speaker asked at the public hearing, why isn’t there a capital replacement fund? with the reply that the county supervisors have never created one — even though there are many aging school buildings, high-mileage vehicles, and old technology systems in the school system that will need to be repaired. One can apply bandaids only so many times before they don’t stick any more.
About the only misstep on the part of the school board was giving in to the Riner whiners. Yes, they have inadequate school buildings and yes, they were promised new buildings. Same goes for Blacksburg, which also had an inadequate high school building that was due to be replaced in the near future. But then the gym collapsed, leaving Blacksburg with NO high school while Auburn still had its buildings. Instead of telling the people in Riner they would have to suck it up for a couple more years, the school board and supervisors fell into the “Blacksburg gets everything” trap (even though that is far from the truth, and Blacksburg actually puts more tax dollars in than the rest of the county) and now we are saddled with this massive tax increase. But it is what it is and it is time for the leaders to actually step up and lead. We can continue to have decent schools (because of the teachers who care, but who may start to bail for greener pastures) or we can opt for a third-world school system next to our world-class university. Perhaps if the supervisors hadn’t mucked about and wasted taxpayers’ money on the silly court suit against the Commonwealth and Norfolk Southern, we would have the intermodal terminal adding to the tax base now, plus some additional commercial/business development to go along with it.
By the way, your massive $345 tax increase works out to $28.75 a month tacked on to the mortgage bill. For some people, that is still a tough hit, but for others that is a meal for four at McDonald’s. Puts it in a different perspective when broken down that way, especially when one considers Big Macs vs. education for the children of the county.
I will agree with Barbara, though, that the folks on Junkin Street aren’t the best stewards of our tax dollars. I, too, wondered why some items from Shawsville, Elliston, Prices Fork, and BHS couldn’t be retained for the new schools instead of surplused for pennies on the dollar. It makes sense to have the school staff close to the county staff (and why can’t the towns and county have some cooperative bulk purchasing plan?), but the school staff can’t/won’t move until it gets new furniture? At the school board meeting Tuesday night, one person questioned why the list of bills being paid couldn’t be listed on the school web site — makes perfect sense, so we could see how our money is being spent.
#2, I agree with your comments. MCSB thinks all it has to do is spend, spend and then ask for more when it runs out of money. This article is great and tells it like it is. The members on the MCSB don’t have a clue on taxes and revenue. The County has other departments that have to be funded, not just the schools. Lets hope the supervisors tell the School Board to stop dreaming in la la land. Better yet, maybe afer Franklins comments, the voters will clean house and get a new Board.