CLT UPDATE
Monday, May 7, 2007
Overrides that ignore "Fixed Costs"
lose
Tax crusader Barbara Anderson, author of
1980's Proposition 2˝ property tax revolt, speaks with conviction when
she says today that "nothing gets done without a crisis." ...
By now, almost everyone knows what the problem areas are. Health
insurance, pension liabilities, energy costs and negotiated pay
increases for teachers, public safety employees and everyone else far
outstrip the ability of local communities to raise the taxes
themselves....
In fact, one of Proposition 2˝'s intended effects was to shift the
education burden away from local property taxes since the outcomes were
inherently unfair and unconstitutional — and the tax burden growing
exponentially to boot....
But Ms. Anderson, who heads Citizens for Limited Taxation and
Government, contends that local officials got lazy, and not only with
schools. "In the 1990s we had all kinds of local aid, and they spent it
on giving in to unions and increasing fixed costs."
"Selectmen in general aren't good at negotiating with unions, and the
unions aren't going to give up anything," she said. "They want their
trips to conferences and to Hawaii on pension issues." To step in, she
said, "It's going to take something dramatic if we're going to have
local officials united in demanding it."
"It" is health insurance and pension reform, she said....
"Proposition 2˝ became law in 1981," [Freetown-Lakeville Superintendent
of Schools Stephen Furtado] said. "We've gone 21 years with this law and
I think it's time that it be re-examined."
But Ms. Anderson is far from agreeing that Proposition 2˝ is the
problem, and that relaxing it is the solution. Instead, keep up the
pressure, she said, and it will force changes in the spending patterns
of local governments.
"Let cities and towns participate in the state's health insurance system
and pension system," she said. "I think we've gotten to that point.
These towns can't stand up to the unions on their own."
"Pensions and health insurance are ticking time bombs if someone doesn't
address them soon," she said....
Ms. Anderson remains unfazed by the turmoil during this budget season,
because it harks back to the unrest that preceded the 1980 taxpayer
revolt. "Suddenly we have a serious crisis in unfunded liabilities," she
said. "If cities and towns are having that trouble now, it can translate
into reforms. And it can happen in time to save communities."
The New Bedford Standard-Times
Sunday, May 6, 2007
Budget woes grip towns
WBZ-TV4
Sunday, May 6, 2007
Keller @ Large
Jon Keller's Morning Guest:
Barbara Anderson, Citizens for Limited Taxation
CLICK ABOVE LINK TO VIEW
(See both Part I and Part II)
Wow, we've never run a Noble winner through the Spin-O-Meter
before, and there's no doubt this fine fellow knows his science. Economics, not
so much.
The Boston Herald
Sunday, May 6, 2007
Jon Keller's Spin-O-Meter
After last week's defeat of a $5 million property tax
increase, Nobel laureate Craig Mello pledged $30,000 toward a "citizens fund" to
help pay the cost of running Shrewsbury's school system.
And echoing Winston Churchill, he asked supporters to keep up the fight and make
donations, too.
"Never surrender!" he wrote in a consolation e-mail to supporters of the
proposed Proposition 2˝ override after Tuesday's vote. "There is too much at
stake!" ...
Mello and his wife, Edit, proposed the "citizens fund" to help avoid some of the
cuts. During the override campaign, the couple had pledged to help any seniors
adversely affected by a tax increase.
Mello was out of town and could not be reached last week, but his wife said he
planned to meet with Superintendent Anthony Bent to discuss their options. The
Mellos have also asked override supporters to donate $400 or more each for the
fund, with the hope of raising $2 million or more.
"We want others to make donations too -- there's an awful lot of rich people
here," she said.
Similar gifts have sparked debate in other communities, especially in cases
where donations were earmarked for specific programs....
"We're always happy to accept money," [School Committee member Deborah Peeples]
said. "They just have to make the check payable to the public schools."
The Boston Globe
Sunday, May 6, 2007
Pass the hat for schools?
Override's defeat spurs call for fund
Gov. Deval Patrick wants to end reliance on local property
taxes to fund public schools. Good! A state funding system would be fairer and
easier to understand....
The state should provide each district an amount equal to its foundation budget.
The additional $4.7 billion needed to do this could be raised through a
statewide property tax. The Proposition 2˝ ceiling for each town could be
adjusted downward to assure that local taxes were reduced by a similar
amount....
Even with these exemptions, the property tax is not the fairest of taxes. We
could shift the burden to taxes better related to ability to pay by raising
state income, sales and corporate taxes (business also benefits from property
tax reduction). However, a $1 billion drop in property taxes would require (for
example) raising the state income tax to 5.5 percent, raising the sales tax to
5.3 percent and increasing business taxes by $250 million ...
By itself, this plan won’t solve the problem of teacher layoffs, outdated
textbooks and forced school closings. Under the current system, most of the
state’s largest school districts already receive additional aid whenever
enrollment rises. Nonetheless, they face funding crises because costs --
particularly health care costs for school employees -- are rising far faster
than the foundation budget....
State funding of schools is a very good idea. I hope the governor persists in
that effort. But it won’t be easy -- or inexpensive!
The Boston Herald
Monday, May 7, 2007
Ed funding needs better base:
Statewide prop tax the solution
By Edward Moscovitch
Chip Ford's CLT Commentary
Proposition 2˝ overrides are big
in the news these days -- especially their defeats in town after town.
Taxpayers seem to be saying they've had enough of the public employee
giveaways year after year, a point we've been making for years. We
warned years ago that this overly-generous and easy-way-out practice
was quickly reaching critical mass. Apparently we've reached it:
Taxpayers are finally awakening and seizing control from their elected
officials, just saying no, no more; deal with what you've got.
Ever skyrocketing,
budget-busting public employee benefits -- despite economic cycles --
have caught in the craw of their employers, we the taxpayers.
Commonly termed "fixed costs," as tax-and-spenders prefer calling them,
can no longer hide behind that ambiguous term. We've all learned
what "fixed costs" mean: The public employees gravy train at
taxpayers expense.
Whether it's Barbara's
appearance yesterday on Jon Keller's Sunday morning public affairs
program, Keller's own Spin-O-Meter article in yesterday's Boston Herald,
or Steve Urbon's in-depth analysis of the situation in yesterday's New
Bedford Standard-Times, the truth is out: those critically
problematic "fixed costs" are the result of fiscal mismanagement and
years of fiduciary irresponsibility by elected officials to taxpayers,
their clients.
Now the tax-and-spenders are
scrambling for alternatives to overrides, bypasses -- reacting to their
defeats. One such reaction is the
senior exemption from override increases should they pass.
These bills would create another divide-and-conquer strategy, much as a
graduated income tax would have encouraged. That is why CLT has
consistently opposed both, consistently opposed pitting one taxpayer
against another. Should the tax-and-spenders ever achieve this
advantage, we taxpayers will be fighting against each other --
instead of collectively against them.
Ed Moscovitch, president of Cape
Ann Economics and longtime adversary of Proposition 2˝,
joined at the hip with Michael Widmer and his so-called Massachusetts
Taxpayers Foundation, has his own plan. Though his plans provide
the same political cover as Widmer's and MTF's, they never seem to get
off the ground, adopted to any significance. But Moscovitch and
Widmer give us a direction toward which the tax-and-spenders are
heading.
You can read all about
Ed Moscovitch and his tax-and-spend philosophy we've tracked over
the years on the CLT website.
Dr. Craig C. Mello, Noble Prize laureate from
Shrewsbury and override deep-pockets, has the right idea -- though we've
been there, tried doing that too. He contributed $10,000 to the
pro-override committee but it failed in that town's largest voter
turnout in recent history. So now he and his wife have "pledged
$30,000 toward a 'citizens fund' to help pay the cost of running
Shrewsbury's school system" from his half-share of the Nobel Prize ($1.4
million). I'm waiting to see how many of the other "awful lot of
rich people here," as his wife Edit described them, will pony up when
it's them or no one.
If CLT's "Voluntary Tax Check-Off" on income tax
returns (allowing those opposed to our tax rollback to pay the old
pre-rollback rate they wanted to keep) is any indication, I hope
Shrewsbury's school administration isn't holding its collective breath
waiting for all those wealthy limousine liberal hypocrites and
Trustafarians to part with their own money.
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|
Chip Ford |
The New Bedford Standard-Times
Sunday, May 6, 2007
Budget woes grip towns
By Steve Urbon
Tax crusader Barbara Anderson, author of 1980's Proposition 2˝
property tax revolt, speaks with conviction when she says today that
"nothing gets done without a crisis."
As SouthCoast communities try to piece together the coming year's
municipal budgets, there isn't much disagreement that a crisis is upon
us now. And to hear local officials, Proposition 2˝ has a lot to do with
it.
Communities across Massachusetts are under fiscal bombardment like they
haven't seen in years. Frayed nerves are showing.
In SouthCoast, most of the Wareham Finance Committee abruptly quit last
week when the selectmen's budget, and not theirs, was the one presented
officially to Town Meeting. Typical of the kind of thing that is
happening almost everywhere, Wareham's selectmen had recommended a
crippling 54 percent cut in the town library budget.
In Dartmouth, 1,000 people confronted the Select Board over draconian
school spending cuts intended to close a $2 million deficit.
Fall River is looking to close four elementary schools to close a $3
million school budget wound.
In Freetown-Lakeville, Superintendent of Schools Stephen Furtado is
taking heat for his plan to close down the swimming pool in the
intermediate school to save the $110,000 that it costs to heat it, and
maybe follow that with user fees for sports — or maybe just eliminating
some altogether.
"Unfortunately, we're building a crisis on the backs of kids," Dr.
Furtado said.
But it's not only schools and libraries, of course. Every department of
local government is a target.
In Acushnet, Finance Committee Chairman Roger Cabral said that "we asked
all department heads to take 1.3 percent out of their budget." They did
so, including $250,000 from the schools.
"We will present a balanced budget (to Town Meeting), and we will touch
very little of our savings," Mr. Cabral said.
Acushnet prides itself on its frugality, and its $2.4 million
stabilization fund brings smiles to the credit rating agencies while
irritating some who believe they are being overtaxed to maintain that
hefty reserve account.
But Mr. Cabral said Acushnet and other towns cannot hold on much longer
under Proposition 2˝, which limits annual property tax hikes to 2.5
percent a year. "I don't think it can continue to work without
additional state aid. I think Proposition 2˝ only works when we can rely
on the state for ever-increasing local aid. If we are forced to live
within the constraints, we're all going to continue to have problems,"
he said.
"It's just bad all around"
Dr. Furtado said that "the 2.5 percent cap in growth is unable to meet
the needs."
"It's just bad all around."
Fall River Mayor Edward Lambert observed recently that the city had used
up almost all of its property taxation headroom under Proposition 2˝.
Taxes there are low and will stay that way, but there is no new money
for new expenses — $3-per-gallon gasoline for police cruisers and city
trucks or double-digit increases in health insurance premiums.
By now, almost everyone knows what the problem areas are. Health
insurance, pension liabilities, energy costs and negotiated pay
increases for teachers, public safety employees and everyone else far
outstrip the ability of local communities to raise the taxes themselves.
Meanwhile, real estate values are down, pushing local property tax
revenues with them. New construction has slowed, cutting off those added
tax opportunities. And state aid hangs on a promised increase after
years of cutbacks, but it's an increase threatened by $330 million in
new overruns on the Big Dig.
Gov. Deval Patrick knows there's a local revenue pinch. In his campaign
last year he pledged property tax relief in the form of more state aid.
But he took office and found a $1 billion deficit. So he shifted gears
and in February proposed a "Municipal Partnership Act" that would allow
local option taxes on restaurant meals and hotel rooms, along with
ending a property tax loophole exempting telecommunications equipment, a
tax break that was passed 90 years ago to encourage the phone companies
to hook up everyone in the state.
The Massachusetts Municipal Association jumped on it. Executive Director
Geoffrey C. Beckwith testified April 10 before the Joint Committee on
Revenue, "the widespread municipal budget shortfalls are structural in
nature and will plague our state again and again, in fiscal 2009, fiscal
2010 and years after, if this local authority is denied to our cities
and towns."
Michael Gilbert, field director for the Massachusetts Association of
School Committees told The Standard-Times, "frankly, education is a
state function," with a certain level of local spending mandated by the
state before additional aid kicks in.
In fact, one of Proposition 2˝'s intended effects was to shift the
education burden away from local property taxes since the outcomes were
inherently unfair and unconstitutional — and the tax burden growing
exponentially to boot.
'Ticking time bombs'
Two things happened. The burden did shift, and with education reform
state aid poured in, along with testing and performance mandates that
kicked in as the years clicked by.
But Ms. Anderson, who heads Citizens for Limited Taxation and
Government, contends that local officials got lazy, and not only with
schools. "In the 1990s we had all kinds of local aid, and they spent it
on giving in to unions and increasing fixed costs."
"Selectmen in general aren't good at negotiating with unions, and the
unions aren't going to give up anything," she said. "They want their
trips to conferences and to Hawaii on pension issues." To step in, she
said, "It's going to take something dramatic if we're going to have
local officials united in demanding it."
"It" is health insurance and pension reform, she said.
Mr. Cabral agreed that these are the sore points. He said Acushnet's
health insurance costs spiked 19 percent this year, "which in Acushnet
means $200,000." Retirement assessments to the Bristol County Retirement
Board, which handles the towns accounts, are up 21 percent, or $150,000.
"We either find the money or cut benefits," he said.
Exactly, says Mr. Gilbert.
Exactly, says Mr. Cabral.
Exactly, says Ms. Anderson.
Exactly, says Dr. Furtado.
"Health care is absolutely strangling first of all our regional budget
and now it's strangling towns," Dr. Furtado said. "We're paying 90
percent for HMOs and 80 percent for PPO's (preferred provider
organizations). That's a wonderful percentage, but it puts a
stranglehold on budgets."
Retirees get the benefits, too, as they do in many cases statewide in
schools, public safety and elsewhere. When a person retires and is
replaced, the town winds up paying health care costs for two people.
"This year we had 18 people retire, and I'm hiring 18 new people. That's
18 new health insurance policies. It's very simple math," Dr. Furtado
said. "When you're looking at a family plan that costs $14,000 and we're
paying 19 percent, you multiply that by 18 and you can see what it does
to our budgets."
Meanwhile, 50 children moved into the district and into the schools to
be educated in a year when the towns are looking for a $1.5 million
school department cutback because of soft revenues.
"Proposition 2˝ became law in 1981," Dr. Furtado said. "We've gone 21
years with this law and I think it's time that it be re-examined."
But Ms. Anderson is far from agreeing that Proposition 2˝ is the
problem, and that relaxing it is the solution. Instead, keep up the
pressure, she said, and it will force changes in the spending patterns
of local governments.
"Let cities and towns participate in the state's health insurance system
and pension system," she said. "I think we've gotten to that point.
These towns can't stand up to the unions on their own."
"Pensions and health insurance are ticking time bombs if someone doesn't
address them soon," she said.
Mr. Gilbert said the Association of School Committees likes the idea of
participating in the state health system, which is a way of grouping
employees to gain leverage with insurance providers. "Access to the
group insurance commission would be helpful to communities," he said.
But he said lawmakers are hinting that they want a two-thirds majority
of local union members to ratify the change.
There is another option: self-insurance. It's an oxymoron to call it
insurance when there is none, essentially, but some towns are doing it,
Mr. Gilbert said. "Saugus is a perfect example. They're self-insured and
have an enormous number of claims this year, and they'll likely end the
year in deficit."
Add this to the pet peeves of local officials: The federal government in
the 1970s passed a special education law and promised to fund 40 percent
of its mandates. "The largest annual percentage they've ever contributed
is 18 percent," said Mr. Gilbert, who credited Massachusetts with
"stepping up to the plate" and capping local expenses for special ed
students.
One size doesn't fit all
So what, then, about these local option taxes on meals and rooms?
Mr. Cabral said that what might help Boston has little bearing on a town
like Acushnet. "How many restaurants are there in Acushnet?" he asked.
Ditto for hotel rooms.
Then what about waste, fraud and abuse in local spending?
That's a question bound to raise hackles. "In Acushnet I think there's a
long history of spending money very carefully," said Mr. Cabral. "You
can't give any one person the credit for it. It's become a mind set in
town where we're very careful about what we do and when we do it, and
when we don't spend money."
"There is no waste in the town of Acushnet," he said flatly.
Dr. Furtado said that "there's a huge amount of frustration among all of
us to try to find a solution. There are only so many ways you can slice
a dollar."
"What's truly unfortunate is that I'm spending way too much time
agonizing over budgets and I'm in the classrooms seeing kids and seeing
what's going on. The budget has become an all-encompassing,
all-consuming responsibility. I've never been to so many budget meetings
in my life.
"Frustration is the key word, believe me," he said.
Mr. Gilbert cautioned against using the "broad brush" of accusations
about overspending. Proposition 2˝ has for years put everyone under
pressure, and nationwide there has been a movement to see to it that 65
percent of school budget spending is on classroom instruction. "If you
went across the state on average you would find that more than 65
percent of every dollar is being spent in the classroom" he said.
But, he added, "I've seen a couple of studies that after 18 years, our
foundation budgets (local spending mandated by the state) are inadequate
to provide the necessary minimal education. We're light about 25
percent."
Ms. Anderson remains unfazed by the turmoil during this budget season,
because it harks back to the unrest that preceded the 1980 taxpayer
revolt. "Suddenly we have a serious crisis in unfunded liabilities," she
said. "If cities and towns are having that trouble now, it can translate
into reforms. And it can happen in time to save communities."
The Boston Herald
Sunday, May 6, 2007
Jon Keller's Spin-O-Meter
WBZ-TV Political Analyst
"It's not about living within our means as the 'no' people say because
we all know that inflation, expecially lately, has been running at much
more than 2 percent."
--Nobel Prize winner Dr. Craig Mello of Shrewsbury, bemoaning that
town's rejection of a Proposition 2˝ override.
Wow, we've never run a Noble winner through the Spin-O-Meter before, and
there's no doubt this fine fellow knows his science. Economics, not so
much. In 32 of the last 63 months, the national inflation rate has been
less than 2 percent. Taxpayers are rejecting overrides because they see
public-worker pension and health-care costs going through the roof, with
little or no effort to rein them in. In other words, it is about living
within our means. And that's what's up, doc.
The Boston Globe
Sunday, May 6, 2007
SHREWSBURY
Pass the hat for schools?
Override's defeat spurs call for fund
By Megan Woolhouse
After last week's defeat of a $5 million property tax increase, Nobel
laureate Craig Mello pledged $30,000 toward a "citizens fund" to help
pay the cost of running Shrewsbury's school system.
And echoing Winston Churchill, he asked supporters to keep up the fight
and make donations, too.
"Never surrender!" he wrote in a consolation e-mail to supporters of the
proposed Proposition 2˝ override after Tuesday's vote. "There is too
much at stake!"
Whether that gift will be accepted and what it could be used for are
just a few of the questions left in the wake of the election. Voters
defeated the proposed override of Proposition 2˝ by 408 votes. The issue
sparked heated debate between those who say the schools desperately need
more funding and those who say taxes in the town are already too high.
Town Clerk Ann Dagle said more than half of the town's 21,000 registered
voters cast ballots, the largest turnout she's seen in her 28 years in
Shrewsbury government. The final tally was 5,568 to 5,160.
Two override supporters, however, won seats on the Board of Selectmen.
Incumbent John Lebeaux was reelected to a fifth term with 6,284 votes
and political newcomer Moira Miller received 4,586 votes, to defeat
Benjamin Tartaglia with 4,032 votes and Mark Adler's 2,449 votes.
Tartaglia was the only candidate to oppose the override.
"It was just a bad idea," Tartaglia said, adding that he expects
override opponents to regroup. "They'll be back in the summertime."
Judy Vedder, chairwoman of a group that campaigned for the override,
YES4Shrews bury, said she would wait to see whether selectmen back
another override vote.
"I'm not going to be leading any charge," Vedder said.
YES4Shrewsbury raised more than $20,000 and organized 200 volunteers for
its campaign to get this year's override passed. Mello, a researcher at
the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester, donated
$10,000 to the campaign from his Nobel Prize winnings.
The budget process will finish with a review of the overall spending
plan by Town Meeting, which begins May 21. Vedder said she hopes Town
Meeting members will consider reducing spending on "nonessential"
services, like $100,000 for lights at Dean Park or more than $200,000
proposed for the Senior Center, in favor of school programs.
The override would have provided $1.8 million more for next year's
budget, more than half of it for the schools. The remaining $3.2 million
would have gone into a stabilization account in anticipation of rising
costs for education, health insurance costs, and pensions. The School
Committee will have to redraft its budget, which was written to include
more than $1 million in override funding.
School administrators have said they would not fill 11 teaching
positions and two instructional aide jobs. The district also plans to
eliminate freshman sports teams, charge fees for intramural sports, and
scrap the purchase of $200,000 in textbooks and classroom materials.
Mello and his wife, Edit, proposed the "citizens fund" to help avoid
some of the cuts. During the override campaign, the couple had pledged
to help any seniors adversely affected by a tax increase.
Mello was out of town and could not be reached last week, but his wife
said he planned to meet with Superintendent Anthony Bent to discuss
their options. The Mellos have also asked override supporters to donate
$400 or more each for the fund, with the hope of raising $2 million or
more.
"We want others to make donations too -- there's an awful lot of rich
people here," she said.
Similar gifts have sparked debate in other communities, especially in
cases where donations were earmarked for specific programs.
In 2005, the Wellesley School Committee turned down $380,000 from an ad
hoc group of parents who wanted to save a popular Spanish language
program from the budget ax. School officials said the gift could set a
dangerous precedent, leading to a curriculum shaped not by educators,
but by whoever in town had the deepest pockets. And last year, the
Newton School Committee returned a check for $50,000 to former mayoral
candidate Michael Striar. He had offered the funding to pay for a
fifth-grade teacher at the Mason-Rice School in Newton Centre.
Newton School Committee member Marc C. Laredo said at the time that
accepting private money "flies in the face of what public schools are
all about."
The Shrewsbury School Committee approved a policy on accepting gifts
last month. It stipulates that "gifts do not entitle the donor to
special consideration." There is no clause, however, that prohibits
them.
School Committee member Deborah Peeples said a subcommittee is
considering ways to create a foundation to support the schools. She
noted that an anonymous donor paid for a Chinese language program.
Another anonymous donor gave the schools $10,000 several years in a row
to fund freshman sports teams.
However, an effort by parents last year to hire a second-grade teacher
at the Spring Street School was rejected because it only benefitted one
school.
"We're always happy to accept money," Peeples said. "They just have to
make the check payable to the public schools."
The Boston Herald
Monday, May 7, 2007
Ed funding needs better base:
Statewide prop tax the solution
By Edward Moscovitch
Gov. Deval Patrick wants to end reliance on local property taxes to fund
public schools. Good! A state funding system would be fairer and easier
to understand.
The state’s foundation budget -- a calculation of how much each district
needs to provide its students with a quality education -- would be
central to the new system. It currently averages about $8,500 per
student -- more for high-poverty districts -- and is adjusted each year
for inflation.
The state should provide each district an amount equal to its foundation
budget. The additional $4.7 billion needed to do this could be raised
through a statewide property tax. The Proposition 2˝ ceiling for each
town could be adjusted downward to assure that local taxes were reduced
by a similar amount.
What could be simpler or fairer? Every student in the commonwealth would
receive an education funded at the foundation budget amount, no matter
where she lived. And every taxpayer in the commonwealth would be taxed
at the same rate to support schools, regardless of where he lived.
Advantages: Funding would increase every year as enrollment increased,
and school officials could count on it. School budgets would no longer
be pitted against the rest of town government. Local officials would no
longer need to resist construction of new homes in their town lest new
children move into town and strain school budgets (sadly, many towns
would still resist new housing).
To make it fairer, the new state property tax should have a homestead
exemption of, say, $100,000. This means a $200,000 home would pay taxes
on only $100,000 of value, while a $1 million home would pay on
$900,000. There could be a double exemption for people over age 65. The
exemption would apply to one home only, and only to people who actually
live in Massachusetts.
Even with these exemptions, the property tax is not the fairest of
taxes. We could shift the burden to taxes better related to ability to
pay by raising state income, sales and corporate taxes (business also
benefits from property tax reduction). However, a $1 billion drop in
property taxes would require (for example) raising the state income tax
to 5.5 percent, raising the sales tax to 5.3 percent and increasing
business taxes by $250 million -- increases that will incur political
cost without increasing revenues available to support state or local
programs.
When critics say “fair” what they really mean is more money for their
town’s school -- at someone else’s expense! Many of the state’s
wealthiest towns (and strongest opponents of the current system)
currently have tax rates half the likely $5 (per $1,000 valuation) state
rate. They will be stunned to learn that “fairness” requires doubling
the school property tax!
By itself, this plan won’t solve the problem of teacher layoffs,
outdated textbooks and forced school closings. Under the current system,
most of the state’s largest school districts already receive additional
aid whenever enrollment rises. Nonetheless, they face funding crises
because costs -- particularly health care costs for school employees --
are rising far faster than the foundation budget.
We should change the inflation adjustment factor to reflect actual
Massachusetts health care and other costs (the current factor is based
on national data) and raise the foundation budget to fit more closely
what schools actually spend. When the extra costs this implies become a
state responsibility, there would be a stronger incentive to address the
problem -- certainly by making sure that teachers received their health
coverage through the more efficient state plan.
State funding of schools is a very good idea. I hope the governor
persists in that effort. But it won’t be easy -- or inexpensive!
Edward Moscovitch is president of Cape Ann Economics.
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