The Harwood Unified Union School District board is in the process of revising and reducing its FY25 budget in hopes of bringing it back to voters in May.
The board’s work is not easy. Robbing from Peter to pay Paul. Sacrificing programming, balancing students’ needs with state and federal mandates in an ever-changing state ed funding landscape.
Reporting on some of the proposed budget cuts for this week’s budget story (Page 7), it was painful to write that “Transportation (field trips and student interns)” and “athletic equipment” are expendable. We shouldn’t have to do this, nor should other Vermont school districts.
This should not be the case. Legislators have known for years that Act 60/68/127 et al didn’t work. Now there’s rumors coming out of Montpelier that “more help” is coming from the House Appropriates Committee for towns that were hit hardest by Act 127, the latest piece of legislation to attempt to fix Act 60/68 etc. H.850 which was supposed to help towns hardest hit did not.
More money from Montpelier in terms of a higher yield would absolutely be helpful. The yield has moved around from $7,100 to $9,775 to $10,000 most recently and even at $10,000, with the most devasting budget cuts, our towns are still looking at double-digit increases.
Sure, more money from Montpelier would help this year, but can we please stop piecemealing this problem? At the risk of beating a dead horse in this space, our education funding system is broken.
What if the Legislature took this seriously – today -- and began the process of throwing out the current method and starting over.
How long would it take? A summer legislate study committee in 2024? A solid proposal in the 2025 session to become effective when? July 1 2025? That is after school districts have had to set budgets and voters have approved or rejected them.
So, a new system would provide no real tax relief until 2026? Our students and our taxpayers deserve better than this.
