Archive for the 'Letter to the Editor' Category

Budget committee is unnecessary

Published by Michael Hoefer on February 28, 2008 in Letter to the Editor, Richmond, School budget and Voting. 0 Comments

(Letter to the editor in support of Article 13 published by the Keene Sentinel February 23, 2008)

With the serious issues facing the Monadnock Regional School District, it is important that we are organized for success.

This is the reason why I and 56 other voters concerned about the future of our district submitted a petition to eliminate the controversial Monadnock budget committee.

It is time to return full budget responsibility to the school board, where it belongs.

Many voters who have attended budget committee meetings have become disenchanted with what they have seen, especially in this past year.

Perhaps that’s why our petition gathered more signatures than any of the 11 other petition articles submitted in the last four years.

A separately-elected budget committee is not required by law.

In fact, a majority of school districts (including many regional and even larger districts) instead give the school board the full accountability and responsibility for governance.

Only the school board has the authority to fine-tune the individual line items of the budget.

Only the school board is adequately equipped, informed, and empowered to balance educational needs with the financial support available from the communities they represent.

Perhaps in some districts budget committees can work, but in ours, as well documented in the pages of The Sentinel, the committee has been a divisive group, more often than not at odds with itself as well as with the school board.

Voters who presume the budget committee helps build budgets and balances the education needs of children against the needs of taxpayers would be wrong.

Its primary function has been to cut budgets after the fact, rather than to help build them from the ground up. It cuts based on arbitrary measures, such as the rate of inflation, without regard to unique circumstances or needs. Those cuts tend to be sweeping, with little regard given for what can be cut to meet the revised bottom line number. That task is somewhat dismissively left to the school board to “figure it out.”

Today it takes 30 elected officials to staff the budget committee and school board. That’s 15 too many. In many district towns, it is difficult to find even one person to run for a school position, let alone finding two. It’s not uncommon to find an unopposed or write-in candidate who is elected due to a lack of competition.

Eliminating the budget committee would help reduce this problem and encourage competition for school board seats.

Let’s end the divisiveness that has plagued the Monadnock district, give the school board the tools needed to lead our district, and let our administrators focus on educational leadership.

Please join me in voting to rescind the budget committee by voting “yes” on article 13.

MICHAEL HOEFER
30 Honey Hill Road
Richmond

Hypocrisy in Fitzwillam

Published by admin on March 8, 2007 in Letter to the Editor. 0 Comments

This is in response to an article that appeared in the Fitzwilliam newsletter from two budget committee members. I would like to encourage the residents of Fitzwilliam to examine the articles on the school district budget for themselves, rather than accepting what they are being told at face value.

Mr. Tommila and Mr. Parker encouraged the residents of our town to vote down the school district budget, saying that it had “gravy” in it. If you look at the notes from the deliberative session the Budget Committee, including Tommila and Parker, voted unanimously for the budget that is being presented. The School Board voted to support this budget as well. One might ask how these two can be for “gravy” one day, and “bare bones” the next.

As far as the open enrollment article that these gentlemen encouraged the voters to vote down, the wording was changed at the deliberative session to enable the school district to charge people from out of district. The district does not want to be paying for out of district students. Tommila and Parker also state that the “purpose of this article appears to be to ensure funding for MC2 at taxpayers expense”. Due to the rewording of the article at the deliberative session, it would “appear” that this is not the case.

I encourage all voters to read the deliberative session minutes, located at mrsd.org. Don’t accept the advice of others without researching the facts for yourself. Be informed before you go to the polls on Tuesday, March 13th. The education of our children is riding on it.

Beth Guion
Fitzwillilam

Don’t fall for scare tactics on schools

Published by admin on March 8, 2007 in Letter to the Editor. 0 Comments

Here they go again.

The Monadnock School Taxpayers Association is up to its scare tactics with the people it claims it was charged to represent.

Group members have done all the work for you and leave you with the sense that they are truly a righteous group of people with only your interests at hand.

I, for one, and a good deal of others, disagree.

Let’s suppose their numbers relating to the tax increase in the Sunday March 4 letter to the editor are valid.

1. Enrollment decline never means the costs are less. If you have 25 students or 20 students, the class still needs to be taught.

You need the teacher, the aides, the building, the heat, the lights, the insurance, the food, etc.

2. They want you to pass the default budget again. That is, as stated in their letter, $900,000 less than the proposed $34,595,273 operating budget.

That is 2.6 percent less than proposed. That will not make their purported $624 Fitzwilliam increase on a $200,000 home disappear.

3. Taxpayers have never been asked to pick up the full cost of out-of-district students attending the Monadnock Community Connections program.

The sending school districts will pay their way. If there was less bad press, there would be more involvement by parents and more students would attend.

The director based her budget on having 45 students from our district, not 16. This was repeated time and again in budget committee and school board sessions, but the taxpayers group representatives chose to ignore or overlook that fact.

4. Article 3, the support staff contract was negotiated in good faith with the school district. The staff is beginning the task of carrying a larger burden of their health costs.

The change is the first step toward a better situation for the school district and the taxpayers. Change does not always happen in one fell swoop. They deserve this contract.

Here’s an idea. The tireless energy of the taxpayers group may better serve their self proclaimed “charges” (you the taxpayers), by channeling that energy in changing the education funding system at the state level.

Why don’t they work with the people in Concord?

They could also get together with the county commissioners.

Shane Maxfield (whose letter to the editor in Saturday’s Keene Sentinel makes perfect sense) could offer them some of his ideas.

A utilitarian jail, with modern features that would be architecturally efficient and safe should cost less.

I am a member of the Monadnock Regional School District Budget Committee.

I have listened all year to both sides, not just at budget committee meetings, but also school board, finance committee, facilities committee, community relations committee and default budget committee meetings.

I am also a charter member of Kids First Monadnock, a group of concerned residents that wants to see every child get the best education possible in this district, while remaining safe, comfortable and in the hands of quality, caring teachers, aides and staff. Your children deserve it and you have the right to expect it.

Please vote on March 13. Vote to support your schools and the future guardians of our society.

Elect people who care about children and education.

Look for the green Kids First Monadnock flyer. It tells the real story and it’s not so scary.

JIM ELLS
P.O. Box 459
West Swanzey

Support the Budget- LTE

Published by admin on February 28, 2007 in Letter to the Editor. 0 Comments

I want to urge the voters of the Monadnock school system to support article 3 of the Monadnock Regional School District warrant to increase wages and benefits of our support staff.

The warrant article is the result of a collective bargaining agreement between the school board and the Monadnock education support staff.

The 196 staff members categorized as support staff are custodians, maintenance people, secretaries and aides, most of whom work directly with special education students, all of whom perform essential functions with great impact on our students’ growth and development.

The bulk of these folks perform some of the toughest tasks for a modest hourly wage.

The support staff has not been under contract for the current school year, and there will be no retroactive pay for this year.

However, in order that our employees stay competitive with new hires and counterparts in other school districts, those that qualify will move up two steps as of July 1.

Not all employees will qualify for step increases.

This negotiated two year agreement also asks that support staff members increase their share in payment of health care premiums, more in line with what we all see in private industry.

This will represent a significant cost savings to the district next year, and the district will realize that savings and more in future years.

Both the school board and administrative staff approve this article.

It was close to being approved by the budget committee, falling short by just seven-tenths of one vote.

The most important ingredient in the educational process is people.

We must attract and retain qualified effective personnel, and should support what is a reasonable negotiated salary and benefit package.

Please send a message by voting in favor of warrant article three, that our support staff is appreciated and that we wish them to continue their efforts on behalf of our community’s youth.

J.E.F. CRAIG
14 Upper Troy Road
Fitzwilliam

We need to move schools forward- LTE Feb 7

Published by admin on February 7, 2007 in Letter to the Editor. 0 Comments

The Monadnock Regional School District, collectively and not as eight individual towns, has the power on March 13 to effect a positive change for our kids and hence our communities.

Our communities will plummet right along with the schools if we don’t stop the downhill slide now.

Businesses and their workers want to contribute to a tax base that gives a return on their dollars and we desperately need to keep them and attract them to our towns. We have created a division amongst ourselves by comparing what we pay to what our neighbors pay in other towns in our district.

The inequities of the statewide property tax cannot be solved at the local level and we all need to tell our reps to find an equitable solution. But we need to move forward as a united front and fix our district now.

While we’ve maintained the status quo with default budgets many issues have been on hold for years, namely our accreditation problem, the building issue that goes along with that and the repair and maintenance issues that have been backlogged.

Any progress within our educational programs has been put on the back burner. But on March 13 we have the power to unite and do the right thing for the kids and our communities.

This year, the warrant of articles, combined, account for a 6 percent increase over the current year.

There is nothing of major consequence on the warrant: no building plans, no contract for the teachers, no new programs.

However, if passed, it allows the district to make headway on those backlogged maintenance issues and keeps a default budget from sending us backward any further on the educational side.

The operating budget increase itself is less than 5 percent and only one of three maintenance articles requires new appropriations.

Both the school board and the budget committee, with the exception of the support staff contract and petition articles, recommend all of the articles.

That is the majority of 30 people that we’ve elected.

We elected them to decipher the spending of the district and come back to us with their opinions. They’re telling us that these expenditures are worthy of our “yes” vote.

The support staff contract missed recommendation from the budget committee by less than one vote and has the support of the school board.

The contract does give our aides, clerical and maintenance staff a raise, but it also requires them to pay a greater share of their healthcare benefits

There was a time when the health care costs were not so astronomical and it will take time to remedy the apportioning of those costs.

We cannot expect the staff to take a huge pay cut to make up the difference. We wouldn’t have any staff left. They would all go elsewhere to work.

It’s very tempting to step into that voting booth where you are all by yourself and vote “no.”

That’s a power we have that is granted us only on the local level. We don’t get to vote directly on the state budget or the federal budget or bridges and highways. Only on the local level do we have that power. Please don’t abuse it. Support your schools and therefore your community as well.

For more information on the warrant articles visit kidsfirstmonadnock.com.

JENNIFER GOMARLO
100 Cram Hill Road
Swanzey