School budgets pass overwhelmingly
DESPITE voicing widespread tax discontent, Long Island voters approved school budgets in high numbers last night - a relief for many local school officials who had cut staffing and other costs in bids for public support.
With all 124 districts reporting, 114 passed - a passage rate of 92 percent. Budgets were defeated in Westbury, East Rockaway, Elwood, Garden City, Levittown, Port Jefferson, West Babylon, West Hempstead, Wyandanch and Herricks - the last by a single vote.
The passage rate is better than average for the Island, though not as high as last year's record 97 percent. Local experts attributed the wins to schools' cost-cutting efforts, and to the Island's history as an education-conscious region.
"You know, I think communities understood how school boards wrestled with keeping expenses under control," said William Johnson, superintendent of Rockville Centre schools and a former president of the State Council of School Superintendents.
"We take our kids very seriously," said Jay L.T. Breakstone, president of the Nassau-Suffolk School Boards Association.
Despite their ballot victories, school officials said they were braced for further fiscal cuts next year, due to the potential end of federal stimulus money that has largely compensated up to now for losses of state financial aid.
"We have a lot more work to do - we're not done yet," said Kim Phillips, president of East Islip's school board. The district's $100.8-million budget passed handily, and a board candidate backed by a local taxpayer group, Philip Montuori Sr., lost his bid for election by a narrower margin.
Stakes in this year's vote were high: Hundreds of dollars in extra taxes for average homeowners in districts where budgets passed, versus increased teacher layoffs, larger classes and losses of programs ranging from music to sports where budgets failed.
In Wyandanch, where the budget went down, 236 to 147, school officials said a second rejection during revotes next month could force the district to cancel all sports - a grim prospect in a low-income community where many students depend on sport achievement for college scholarships.
"I'm telling you, we may have to close the schools down because our students are entitled to an education," said Denise Baines, the school board president who won re-election.
Divisions in voting affected families and school districts.
Michael Leo of Shirley voted against a proposed $200-million budget in William Floyd, while his wife, Helen, voted in favor - and the budget did pass. Spending will rise 2.75 percent under the plan, and taxes 8.53 percent, even though the district plans to save money by eliminating 150 staff positions and reducing full-day kindergarten to half-day.
"I'm not going to pay $5 million more and not get anything for it," said Michael, unemployed for nearly two years.
But his wife said it is important to educate children. The couple's children are grown.
"I don't like to see the kids get hurt," Helen Leo said.
Like William Floyd, most of the Island's other 123 districts are trimming staffs and holding next year's proposed spending relatively low - to an average increase of 2.36 percent. But projected tax hikes are significantly higher - an average 3.41 percent, or more than a percentage point above the regional inflation rate.
Lindenhurst, for example, plans to cut about 40 teaching positions next month, to hold down next year's cost increase to less than 1 percent on a $137-million budget. Even so, the district projects a 3.87 percent tax hike.
School administrators in Lindenhurst and other districts point out that Gov. David A. Paterson has called for cutting the Island's school aid by $172.6 million - or 1.6 percent of the region's total school revenues. Meanwhile, state lawmakers are more than a month past their deadline for either accepting Paterson's plan or adopting an aid package of their own.
As a result, school leaders explained that they have been forced to project higher property tax increases than they would like, to compensate for anticipated state aid cuts.
Many Lindenhurst residents found this convincing and passed the budget. Ed Meinhold, a resident and retired BOCES instructor, contends that negative votes increase school costs in the long run, forcing districts to postpone building maintenance and other needs. "The budget supports the kids, and I'm all for the kids," Meinhold said.
With Stacey Altherr
