Paterson calls for 5 percent school aid cut |
On Board Online • January 25, 2010
By Marc Humbert
Senior Writer
Gov. David Paterson’s call for a 5 percent reduction in state school aid as part of his $134 billion budget proposal means 589 school districts would lose more than $1.1 billion in aid while 87 districts would see aid increases totaling $66.5 million.
Assuming local tax revenues are stable, districts would have to trim their 2010-11 budgets by 2.1 percent overall, Paterson said. And, he pointed out that school districts statewide have undesignated reserves of $1.5 billion.
Paterson would also extend the postponement of a foundation aid package designed to help urban districts and bring the state into compliance with court rulings that found New York has been shortchanging students from New York City.
Originally, the phase-in of that funding was supposed to take four years, but it was extended to seven years in the state budget adopted last year. The new Paterson plan would extend the phase-in to a full 10 years, and the
current two-year freeze on foundation aid instituted last year would be extended an extra year, through 2011-12.
NYSSBA President Florence Johnson called the proposed school aid cut “painful,” predicting that many districts that are highly dependent on state aid will be forced to deplete reserve funds and, in some cases, cut programs.
Echoing those concerns, state Board of Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch said she feared “the cuts to school funding are going to be significant.”
“We are going to be looking at teacher layoffs in districts across the state,” Tisch told On Board in discussing the possible fallout from reduced state aid. “We are going to be looking at a diminution, frankly, of the quality of education as a result of cuts that are going to be targeted toward classrooms in very specific ways.”
While agreeing, NYSSBA Executive Director Timothy G. Kremer said Paterson deserved praise for including in his budget plan several proposals to reduce costly state mandates and to allow schools to operate more efficiently – items NYSSBA has advocated for years and emphasized as part of its “Be the Change for Kids” self-help campaign for New York schools.
Silver: Paterson’s cuts “go too far”
The budget proposal is subject to revision by the Legislature and proposals to cut school aid are never popular with legislators, particularly in an election year, such as 2010.
In fact, state Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, a fellow Manhattan Democrat, declared that Paterson’s proposed cuts to education, health care and social programs “go too far.”
Equally critical was state Senate Democratic Majority Leader John Sampson, who said, “Some components of his proposal clearly need modification.”
Tension between Paterson and the Democratic leaders of the Legislature has been increasingly evident in recent months as the governor, faced with low approval ratings, has pointedly attacked the Legislature. His State-of-the-State message on Jan. 6 was an attack on irresponsible stewardship in Albany, including a protest over the influence of lobbyists and a call for stronger policing of legislators’ ethics.
“He’s tried to politically pin everything that’s wrong with government on us,” Assemblyman Jeffrion Aubry (D-Queens) told The Buffalo News. “I don’t like it. I don’t think any of my colleagues like it.”
Paterson’s rationale
Paterson said he had little choice but to cut state school aid to $20.5 billion, down from $21.6 billion. State spending, fueled by a Wall Street boom, had grown an average 8 percent a year in the five years before he became governor in 2008, he noted.
“And then the music stopped,” Paterson said in his Jan. 19 budget address. “Our revenues have crumbled and our budget has crashed. We can no longer afford this spending addiction we have had for so long.”
Paterson said the new budget had to deal with a $7.4 billion gap. Under the plan, overall state spending would grow by 0.9 percent, excluding capital projects, Paterson said. Add in the building work and the state spending would grow by 1.9 percent.
In addition to the school aid cut, Paterson called for reducing the growth in health care spending by $1 billion and cutting state agency spending by $1 billion. He also called for $1 billion worth of tax and fee increases, including a $1 per pack hike in the cigarette tax. He renewed his call for a tax on non-diet soda, a proposal that was quickly shoved back in the icebox last year after pop-swilling New Yorkers and the beverage industry objected.
Counting chickens
Paterson said he was including in his budget proposal a $750 million appropriation “in anticipation of a successful application for competitive funds through the federal Race to the Top program.” But Paterson said just hours after unveiling his budget proposal that the Legislature’s reluctance to raise the cap on the number of charter schools allowed in the state (see story, page 1) meant New York “may now miss out” on the funding.
The Paterson school aid package, as outlined in budget documents, actually calls for a $2.1 million reduction in state aid through a “gap elimination adjustment” that would be charged against all aid categories except those covering universal pre-kindergarten and building projects. The reductions would be offset by the use of $726 million in federal stimulus funding and by the $367 million in the growth of expense-based aid for such things as building, transportation and BOCES.
The aid reductions would be based, in part, on student needs and the economic conditions of each school district. Paterson said wealthy districts would face larger cuts.
Repeal the Wicks Law
Paterson sought to soften the blow for school districts by proposing a wide array of proposals for mandate relief and other potential cost-saving measures, among them a repeal of the Wicks Law requirement for school districts. He said that piece alone could save districts $200 million annually in construction costs.
But the governor also wants school districts to begin picking up, from counties, any increased cost that exceeds 2 percent for pre-school special education programs.
Paterson noted that previous governors have called for even larger school aid reductions. Fellow Democrat Mario Cuomo proposed a 10.2 percent cut in his 1991-92 budget plan. The Legislature trimmed that to 6.1 percent. And, Republican George Pataki called for an 8.5 percent cut as part of the 2003-04 budget as the state sought to dig out from under the economic calamity caused by the 2001 terrorist attacks. Lawmakers went instead for a 1.2 percent cut in school aid.
It is not the first time Paterson has sought to cut school aid. He proposed a $698 million, or 3.3 percent, cut in aid last year as New York began to face the fiscal realities of the economic recession. A federal stimulus package bailed the state out and school aid was increased by $405 million, or 1.9 percent.
But as the economic downturn lingered, state revenues faltered throughout 2009. Late in the year, Paterson called for a nearly $700 million cut in the middle of the school year. The Legislature balked and instead raided the federal stimulus account earmarked for next year to the tune of $391 million.
With lawmakers refusing to cut school aid, mid-year, Paterson did withhold $146 million in school aid in December along with $436 million in reimbursement to school districts for STAR property tax relief. After NYSSBA and others sued over the withholding, Paterson restored the payments.