{"id":2113,"date":"2010-05-17T06:07:56","date_gmt":"2010-05-17T10:07:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/?p=2113"},"modified":"2010-05-17T06:10:13","modified_gmt":"2010-05-17T10:10:13","slug":"time-to-tackle-the-north-countrys-school-district-budget-crisis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/2010\/05\/17\/time-to-tackle-the-north-countrys-school-district-budget-crisis\/","title":{"rendered":"Time to tackle the North Country’s school budget crisis?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Voters go to the polls tomorrow to vote on their local school district budgets.<\/p>\n

We have two stories this morning — one from Jonathan Brown<\/a> and the other from Karen DeWitt in Albany<\/a> — illustrating just how grim the situation has become.<\/p>\n

Governor David Paterson wants to withhold $1.5 billion in payments to schools by several weeks.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, most school leaders in the North Country are busy laying off teachers, cutting costs, and raising taxes.<\/p>\n

In an editorial over the weekend, the Glens Falls Post Star’s Ken Tingley<\/a> argues that it’s time for school boards to wrestle with the systemic funding crisis schools now face.<\/p>\n

The reality is that less state aid, not more, will be available a year from now. And if the Legislature ignores the fiscal realities, a financial calamity of epic proportions could occur.<\/p>\n

Our school boards need talented, intelligent representatives of the community who are not only educators, but accountants and business people who know their way around budgets and spreadsheets.<\/p>\n

They need to be tough and innovative to find a way thorough this crisis while maintaining high educational standards.<\/p>\n

Sure, it would be nice to think the worst is over, but the numbers say different.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Adirondack Daily Enterprise also ran a lead editorial<\/a> over the weekend urging voters to pay close attention this election season.<\/p>\n

This year, more than any other in recent memory, the affordability of our education system has been challenged. Our schools’ enrollment has been dropping drastically and isn’t yet showing signs of improvement.<\/p>\n

The state government is in crisis and doesn’t look like it’s going to get better for some time. Unionized public employees, who have gained compensation and influence over the decades, are being targeted with demands to give some of it back.<\/p>\n

Many – including us – say it’s time to look at consolidating districts’ administration to keep the impact on students to a minimum. These are tough times.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So what do you think?\u00a0 Do you plan to vote tomorrow?\u00a0 If so, is your local school district saying the right things about taxing and spending?\u00a0 How about your teachers?\u00a0 Are they making the right concessions?<\/p>\n

Comments welcome.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Voters go to the polls tomorrow to vote on their local school district budgets. We […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2113"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2113"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2113\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2114,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2113\/revisions\/2114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}