Monfredo: Needed - Advocates to Move the Foundation Budget Forward

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Sunday, February 12, 2017

John Monfredo, GoLocalWorcester MINDSETTER™

As an educator and now as a school committee member this time of the year is not my favorite.  Why, because it’s BUDGET time and it’s a time when we realize that education continues to get the short end of the stick!  I remember being part of a rally for education in Worcester back in 2007.  At that time we had just experienced five years of budget cuts …

• WE  HAD TO DISRUPT THE LIVES OF OUR CHILDREN BY CLOSING 8 SCHOOLS
• WE  CUT 576 POSITIONS – PEOPLE WHO SERVED OUR CHILDREN
• STATE GRANTS Had BEEN CUT BY $12 MILLION DOLLARS
• CUTS IN OUR ARTS PROGRAMS, CUTS TO SCHOOL LIBRARIANS, CUTS TO OUR SCHOOL LIAISON TEAM ( THE SCHOOL LIASON TEAM WAS A STRONG LINK TO OUR PARENT INVOLVEMENT  PROGRAM FOR INNER-CITY CHILDREN)
• CUTS TO SCHOOL SUPPLIES
• CUTS IN PREVENTIVE PROGRAMS AND  IN PERSONAL SUCH AS TUTORS, ADJUSTMENT COUNSELORS AND   PRE-SCHOOL PROGRAMS
• CUTS TO STAFF DEVELOPMENT TRAINING

 

Many of those cuts have never come back in future budget.  For the sake of our children we need to have funding that is adequate, equitable and predictable.  At the present time our chapter 70 funding is inadequate, inequitable and very unpredictable.     

The budget all starts at the state level for if the state does not make education a high priority there goes the budget for Worcester. 

 According to the Mass. Budget and Policy Center, if you look at the present chapter 70 funding and factor in inflation, we still remain well below the amount in the 02 funding. 

The good news has been that our legislators did address the Foundation Budget, Chapter 70. A Foundation Commission led by Senator Sonia Chang-Diaz and Representative Alice Peisch led the commission whose mission was to determine the educational programs and services necessary to achieve the commonwealth’s educational goals and to review the way foundation budgets are calculated.  Their job was to make recommendations for potential changes in those calculations as the commission deems appropriate. In their research “The Commission” found the Foundation Budget to be woefully underfunded and has made several recommendations.  

Needless to say the Commission did an outstanding job BUT our legislators have not implemented changes. 

Last year, Brian Allen, the Worcester Public Schools chief financial officer, pointed out to the Local Legislative delegation that based on findings by the “ Foundation Budget Commission ” the budget is underfunded in the current foundation budget formula.  Areas of concern are health insurance, special education and the skipped inflation adjustment in 2010. This information was addressed in a GoLocal story by me last month. 

 I did state then and again now that obviously the full package cannot be funded in one year but there has to be a starting point for the legislators to move the needle.  Why not what do was done from 1994 to 2000 when the original Foundation budget was created?   Phase the funding over seven years and this would have less of an impact on the State budget.  Since then the school committee did have another meeting with our local delegation and it is our hope that some changes will take place.  Although I have to say that no one stepped up to say that they would lead the charge.

I discussed the budget issue with Mr. Allen who stated that it is important that the state budget fully fund both charter school reimbursement and special education circuit breaker funding. Worcester is underfunded by approximately $1 million in these two areas this year and these line items are level-funded next year, so it appears that these are underfunded again in FY18.   He estimated that an increase of $50 million in charter school reimbursement and $20 million in the SPED circuit breaker in the state budget would be needed to be fully funded.  As for Worcester, the schools are facing a $21 million gap between what the schools will spend and what the needs will be as a result of continuous underfunding by the state. 

One bill being circulated in the state is by Senator Sonia Chang-Diaz, the same Senator who co-chaired the Foundation Commission.  Her bill is to move the foundation review commission recommendations forward.   Senator Chang-Diaz believes that the current climate is more favorable to moving the funding proposal forward in hopes of closing the achievement gap.

Now we as citizens of this commonwealth have a choice to be advocates for educational change or sit on the sidelines.  Remember people power has made and will continue to make a difference in our government.  The non-voters, our children, deserve our support.  PLEASE call or email your Senator and State Representative to tell them to move forward on the Foundation Budget.  

Senator Chandler – 617 -722-1544 or [email protected]

 Senator Moore – 617- 722-1485 or  [email protected]

State Representative Mahoney – 617 -722-2460 or [email protected]

Mary Keefe – 617 722-2210 or  [email protected]

Jim O’Day – 617 -722 -2090 or James.O'[email protected]

Dan Donahue – 617 – 722-2006 or [email protected]

Kate Campanale – 617 – 722-2488 or  [email protected]

Kimberly Ferguson – 617 – 722- 2263 or   [email protected]

Let me end by remembering what our former U.S. Senator Paul Tsongus stated back in 1989 in a visit to Worcester, “Nothing is more important to the development of a vital downtown and the economy than the quality of education of the public education system.”

May I remind everyone that quality education is an investment in our community and failure to educate is the real expense. Let’s move forward with the Foundation Budget, now!

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