By Carlton Cummiskey
I am writing to the local taxpayers to urge them to vote yes for the school budget on Town Meeting Day. I'm a junior at Harwood, and I have served as the student representative on the Harwood Unified Union School District Board for over a year. I have attended nearly every board meeting and can assure everyone that the budget decisions made by the board were difficult decisions that were not taken lightly.
Lots of rumors and false information have been flying around the school and community this past week, and it's important that we focus on facts and what is really going on. It has been an incredibly emotional time for all of us in the school community – teachers that we love are being let go. But it's important to realize that nobody wanted to let these teachers go.
When the board originally started looking at budget options, there was a very harsh reality: Keeping the budget the same would cause just under a 10 percent tax increase in some towns, so the board looked for other options to keep the budget at a manageable increase.
With the original option presented, Option 1, the board was faced with cutting many programs including the new hearing project that would allow all students to access basic education, Professional Development, the Wellness Center position, a music teacher from Crossett, World Language PK-4, chorus and band for fifth through sixth, and many more essential programs that make our school systems so great. When the board saw this option, they obviously turned it down because nobody wants to cut so many valuable programs.
OTHER OPTIONS
They looked at the other options to save the same amount of money but without the loss of programming, which is where Budget No. 5 came in – it's one of only three budgets where those valuable programs don't get cut. Option 5 would achieve the board's goal of only a 2.2 percent increase in the budget while (theoretically) having no program loss at Harwood Union High School and more programming for the Harwood Union Middle School students (since they would now gain access to programs like sustainability that they did not have before).
Yes, some teachers will be cut due to the teachers union seniority-based system, but it is important that we make sure everyone knows that it is teachers being cut, not school programs. Yes, this budget cuts teachers, but it still is not the budget with the most teacher cuts. Other budget options reviewed by the board definitely had more teacher cuts than the budget they are presenting to voters. And at this point, given other retirements that have been submitted since the RIFs were announced, the two teachers who were going to be cut from the high school are not going to be cut. If additional attrition or retirement occurs, it is possible that even fewer cuts will happen than anticipated.
Although I am not old enough to vote, I am a student impacted by these decisions and having sat through most school board meetings and seen the scenarios presented to the board, I truly feel this budget is the best option for students and taxpayers. I would like to urge all voters to support this budget. Review the facts and consider that if this budget is voted down, more teachers could be cut than in the proposed budget and all schools could be faced with programming loss.
Cummiskey lives in Warren
