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062504 Benefits should face careful scrutiny by board
To the Editor:
As a parent with children attending college and graduate school, I understand the importance of providing a first-rate education for the children of our community. As a parent approaching retirement and paying three tuitions, I share my neighbors' concerns about school taxes. It is the school board's responsibility to balance these seemingly conflicting interests.
While combing through the budget line by line and reducing, for instance, purchases of supplies, certainly can capture some short-term savings, addressing the big ticket items in the budget will have a far greater impact in the long run. Benefits and salaries account for 77.1 percent of next year's budget. The growth in the cost of benefits warrants a close look at how they can be more efficiently administered. Holding down salary costs through negotiations could result in substantial savings in future budgets, as was accomplished during my prior two terms on the school board.
Achieving educational excellence means continuous updating of our program. Some exciting additions and changes are already planned. Yet not every change requires large spending increases. Before modifying the curriculum, several questions must be answered. How does this change benefit children? Can it be implemented using existing resources? Does it eliminate the need for another program? Can staff training for the new program be combined with other training?
As a school board candidate, I believe that by focusing on the large categories of expenditures and analyzing how new programs are instituted, we can effectively gain more control over future budgets without sacrificing quality education.