On June 1, Medford Council will vote to move November school voting to April. Mayor Beenstock and Councilman Denn oppose this nonsense. Councilman Buoni is the champion of this anti-school measure spun as taxpayer right. The real intent is to usurp the elected Board of Education.
Great schools are the cornerstone of great towns and home values. Medford schools are amongst the top in South Jersey. Incredibly, Buoni was quoted in the press that Medford schools “are a bottomless (spending) pit, and the worst part is we are not getting any return for our dollar”. Obviously Buoni’s scheme is to control school spending and commandeer the purview of the elected school board.
Currently school budgets are only voted upon if there is a tax increase of 2 percent. No other budgets at the federal, state or local level, except fire districts, are voted upon. Those budgets are approved by elected bodies. In the past school budgets votes were in April with low turnout and the school budget became the whipping boy for all taxes. The animus between school parents and anti tax foes was disruptive, and mean spirited. Town Council had the authority to alter defeated budgets. Thus for political reasons there was a slash and burn mentality.
Purportedly less than 20 school districts from 600 in New Jersey have April budget votes which will cost Medford $30,000.
Local school tax is 48 percent of property taxes. A 2 percent school hike yields a 1 percent increase (about $100 per home). For 2016 it was only $48. It is insane to disrupt the whole community over a possible 1 percent tax increase.
School aid is funded by income taxes. When the income tax was implemented most districts including Medford received 45 percent aid for the school budget. Medford now gets 10 percent as Trenton has shifted our tax dollars to other districts. We get less atate aid in dollars than 20 years ago. If we could get 45 percent our school tax would decrease about 40 percent.
Federal and state governments has placed unfunded costly mandates on schools driving up costs. The number of students needing special education has risen and is now 18 percent of our student body. Those kids need our help but costs as much as double or more than regular education students. Medford district spending per student versus all New Jersey K-8 districts is middle of the pact, not at the top.
Buoni is grandstanding and should be convincing Trenton to give us our fair share of school funding. We don’t vote on the township or other budgets so he is hypocritical.
Medford Township put $1 million in reserve from the 2015 municipal budget and appears to rebudget the $1 million excess. If not needed, council could have reduced taxes $110 on average home or double the $48 increase for the local school district this year.
The resolution vote on June 1 is not worth the acrimony over a potential 1 percent tax increase. Please come to the meeting, email or call Council to cease this power play.
William Love
