Each year, school boards and district administrators who have worked together with citizen budget committee members to craft spending plans wait tensely to see how the vote will go.
There was a time when approval for the average school district budget was almost a no-brainer. That was then. This is now, a time in which we're all being jammed up directly or indirectly by the relentless demand for more money to meet state mandates, replace outmoded facilities and equipment, improve staff pay and benefit packages, and support non-classroom activities.
One result is that budgets no longer get the easy OK. The winning margin this year was less than 100 votes in numerous school districts. Such razor-thin margins could easily have gone the other way if more than a tiny fraction of eligible voters had turned out.
We need to be looking everywhere possible for inspiration on how to fix this funding mechanism that, if not utterly broken, certainly is about to pop some springs.
One place to look might be just across the Hudson River in Saratoga County. Voters in the Mechanicville district -- some of whom reside in the Rensselaer County town of Schagticoke -- rejected the proposed budget. Twice. That triggered a state-mandated shift to a contingency budget for the 2006-07 school year, under which the school board cut $719,000 that would have funded interscholastic sports.
Mechanicville folks are rather proud of their school's athletic prowess, so sports booster clubs and others pitched in to raise money to support the teams.
I can understand their interest in sports, having played on several teams in high school and college and spending a few early-career years as a sportswriter. And, I recognize the value of competition, teamwork and physical fitness that can stem from such activity.
However, I also recognize the value of having a full teaching staff, a comprehension of fiscal realities, and the setting of real-world priorities. The first phase of sports support had an $84,000 target.
Something in the range of another $125,000 or so will be needed for winter and spring sports. No word yet on what sort of fundraisers the district's residents might be planning to restore teaching and other positions the contingency budget cut, but at least the jocks and cheerleaders will be taken care of.
Mechanicville sports fans have expressed happiness the $84,000 target was reached. If they could recognize the pathetic irony in how that was accomplished, they wouldn't. The fundraisers, you see, collected just $74,000. State Sen. Majority Leader Joe Bruno of Rensselaer County, who also represents Mechanicville, kicked in the other $10,000 from the taxpayer-funded slush fund to which he has uncontrolled access.
In other words, Mechanicville residents twice voted not to have to pay taxes that would have supported the school budget as proposed, but Bruno decided in his wisdom that it was just fine to shovel taxpayers' money into his district so kids could play games.
What a lovely incentive for people who want to work the angles to get what they want as long as other people pay for it. What a constructive life lesson.
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