Thank you for visiting and for your kind words. I really appreciate them!
Where I'll be tonight: CSB program review task group meeting (talking about how to maximize our Medicaid billing - please join us if you've got insight into this issue!). And then on parent duty while Teh Spouse is at a town hall meeting in South Riding.
If you're going to be at the town hall meeting, please remember that the BOS gives a bucket of money to the School Board, but it's the School Board who decides how to spend that bucket of money. If they don't choose to spend it on teacher raises, that's not something the BOS can control.
Hi Liz! I wanted to point out a couple of things as a comment to your post about the upcoming (and ongoing) budget process - a nightmare that both you and I live year after year from two different perspectives, and in our roles as support systems....
ReplyDeleteSpecifically to address your quote, "If you're going to be at the town hall meeting, please remember that the BOS gives a bucket of money to the School Board, but it's the School Board who decides how to spend that bucket of money. If they don't choose to spend it on teacher raises, that's not something the BOS can control."
Loudoun Education Alliance of Parents hosted a program in October of 2008 to make the process more transparent. We had presenters evenly representing both sides. There were 2 Supervisors who spoke (Sally Kurtz and Jim Burton) 2 School Board Members (John Stevens and Tom Reed) and 1 member of the financial administrative staff from both sides (Ben Mays, LoCo and Leigh Burden, LCPS). I urge you and your readers to review the minutes from that meeting, which can be found here: http://cmsweb1.loudoun.k12.va.us/50911556145657/FileLib/browse.asp?A=374&BMDRN=2000&BCOB=0&C=84480 - October minutes.
In that presentation, the delegates were informed that while the BoS doesn't tell LCPS HOW to spend their money (although in Board comments they do tend to perform a line item analysis), they are chiefly in control of how much money they have to allocate to each need. The fewer the dollars, the thinner the disbursement over all areas. When population increases, and buildings have to be built, and salaries have to be raised AND created for new-hires, it is quite a challenge. So, in essence, the BoS are pretty much the folks that need appealing to for pay increases in terms of overall general funding. The School Board never needs convincing of that as a priority.
From that October '08 meeting, a quote from Leigh Burden, the LCPS Assistant Superintendent of Business and Financial Services, "LCPS funding allocation is 62.2% to Salaries; 25.3% to Employee Benefits; 5.3% to Materials and Operations; 6.9% to Contractual Services; and .3% to Capital."
I want to echo Liz's remarks. It is quite true that the Supervisors do not have the ability to direct the SB how to distribute the funds they receive. Nonetheless, the Supervisors' allocation of funds directly impacts the possible uses of funds. Inadequate funding ties the hands of the SB in their ability to provide salary increases for employees, maintain programs, keep increasing class sizes at bay, etc. It is important to remember the role of both boards and the responsibility of both boards to provide for Loudoun's children.
ReplyDeleteThank you both for commenting!
ReplyDeleteI totally agree that the BOS needs to make sure that the bucket of money given to the SB is of an adequate size to maintain our high quality school system - which is one of the best in the country! But they also need to adequately fund things like Family Services and their various other departments which serve highly vulnerable people.
There are going to be a lot of cuts to the budget this coming year - some of those cuts will HAVE to be in the school budget or else the BOS will have to end all the other programs.
Unless, of course, the BOS is willing to raise the tax rate. Which could cause it's own problems in increasing foreclosures.
Gah! "its" not "it's"
ReplyDeleteSorry.