Another DOE Doozie: Budget Proposal Cuts State Support of Transportation to Schools by 25%

Under the DOE's proposed budget, the State will only fund 75% of transportation costs of Public and Charter Schools next year.   The proposal directs local districts to pick up 25% of costs.  Independent schools will lose all transportation funding.  The cuts are directed at protecting the "classroom" according to an interview taped yesterday by WDEL with State Sec. of Ed, Lillian Lowery.
The following text is from that interview.
The interview can be viewed here:  http://www.wdel.com/video/?v=education.wmv
I'd say my comments follow at the end, but this one left me speechless.  Let's protect the classroom, only it's not much of a classroom if we can't afford to get the students there.

Dr. Lowery:  Well, I think the major piece is looking at the transportation piece for both public and independent schools and um trying to look at the use of the state dollars and see if we can find efficiencies at the local level where they can capture some of those costs.  With the 25/75 % split, with 25 % of the costs coming from the local jurisdiction.  We also looked at consolidating services where we possibly could.  Um, Mike Jackson, our associate secretary for finance is working with the Chiefs and heads of charters to look at procurement services so we can share costs through volume, find efficiencies there. And there are just some other hard decisions that we are going to have to make.  Some things, as we all know here today will go away.  And so we have to look at what is essential. And to the best of our ability protect the classroom so that the services or any programatic cuts that we make, as much as we can, make sure that they come from outside of the classroom, that we protect teaching and learning. 

When asked if the new plan was putting any unnecessary pressure on the districts or if it may mean cuts for local districts, she responds: 

Well, um, I hope really that we could work very collaboratively together.  We have a lot of creative, unique ideas of where we can mitigate those circumstances.  And, but, it comes to a point where, when people have been used to doing things certain ways that it's very hard to think outside the box of how we can be more creative managing and mitigating costs.  Now, at the end of the day, um, if millions of dollars go away, we have to find out and come to some terms about what are essential services and that's what we will have to find.  So if things go away we hope that they will be those that are most um most removed from our essential work which is teaching and learning and protecting the classroom. 

Interviewer:  So you're hoping it won't force districts to cut teachers?

We're hoping.  We hoping that they can find effficiences.  Yet by no means am I going on record saying what will and will not happen.  But we are going to work very hard with them to mitigate that as much as possible as much as we can. 

When asked if eliminating funding for private school transportation essentially forces parents to pay taxes for public schools and not get anything out of it, she responds:

Yeah, well, I mean one could look at it that way.  We talk about that.  But, ah, it's tax payer, and I really do emphasize with them, I have a relationship with our independent schools both private and parochial, but as tax payers of Delaware, we have lots of good services, too, from which they benefit.  But, it is the Governor and his staff, including the Department of Education personnel, have put forth our budget.  Now, it's in play and is going through the process.  At the end of the day we'll see what are decisions that we will have to make including ones around transportation, both public and private. 

When asked how she feels about the effect of Stimulus money to the the budget, Lowery responds:

Well, I really do think someone made a great point.  One of the representatives, Senator Miro, the monies because of that 800 million dollar budget deficit last year were removed from the general fund um, with the understanding from President Obama and Vice President Biden that their administration was going to try to put stimulus funds in to try to circumvent some of the hard hard decisions.  We just have to remember that we knew going into this that the monies had been moved from the general fund because we had like a 25 percent structural deficit and these monies were going to come in to help us mitigate that so the impact would not be so quickly and so severe.  Um, but here it is.   We have to plan for that and we should have been as the governor has expected all of his agencies to do, planning for the possible loss of of these funds because we knew it was coming. 

When asked about the new teachers that Gov. Markell made mention of in his Budget Address, she answers:

One has to understand that teachers are not hired at the state level.   We really do, um, the Gov. has put forth a budget where the govenor's intention is that there will be no personnel costs for teachers or any other state employees. But at the end of the day the local jurisdictions who have boards elected by their constituents and they choose superintendents, have to make decisions. If peoples enrollments decline, as we've just discussed, federal and local dollars decrease, local jurisdictions have to make some hard decisions.  We're going to work with them as much as we possibly can to come up with alternative ways of thinking and saving so we can protect as much as we can.  But at the end of the day, the local jurisdictions will have to make decisions based on their realities.   That's just not a perscriptive statewide um cookie cutter approach.  One has to act according to his local needs. 

When asked to offering examples of creative thinking, Dr. Lowery suggests:

Well, with transportation, is there any way for example that counties can merge specialized transportation for students who go to alternative schools, for students who go to countywide programs.  If they are going, having extracurricular activities is there any way they can merge those costs together.  Look at what kind of cost savings we have around buying textbooks.  If, if your district is next door to my district which is next door to another district and we're all using the same math book, but you're paying one cost for it, I'm paying another, the other district is paying another because we are negotiating with vendors individually instead of as a collaborative where we can get more volume and then be a little more forceful in our negotiations.  Those are the kinds of things we have to start thinking about.