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Star Ledger - Rhetoric less heated in N.J. school elections this year, experts say... "When a budget is cut, you live with those cuts for subsequent years," Saiff (Highland Park School Board President) said. "When you cut off an appendage, it’s not growing back. It’s gone and you learn to live without it." The growing costs of charter schools have become an increasingly visible issue in Highland Park, Saiff said. This year, for example, the Middlesex County district sent $22,000 to two local charters that have enrolled former borough students. Next year, the board expects that number to jump to $300,000, she said. "That’s another cost we will have to deal with and another drain on the budget," said Saiff, who opposes a plan to open a third charter school in town.
Charter schools are becoming a hot issue in a growing number of communities and in elections across the state, said Lynne Strickland, executive director of the Garden State Coalition of Schools. "The more charter schools expand, the more people become concerned about them," said Strickland, who represents about 100 districts in mostly suburban communities. "Charter schools cost local taxpayers money, and it’s one budget item they have no say over."
Associate Press-The Record - NJ school elections less fiery a year after revolt
Star Ledger - If N.J. Supreme Court orders increased school aid, Gov. Christie says not complying is among ‘options’
Philadelphia Inquirer - Christie v. Court: Is threat for real?
Star Ledger - Rhetoric less heated in N.J. school elections this year, experts say
"When a budget is cut, you live with those cuts for subsequent years," Saiff (Highland Park School Board President) said. "When you cut off an appendage, it’s not growing back. It’s gone and you learn to live without it."
The growing costs of charter schools have become an increasingly visible issue in Highland Park, Saiff said. This year, for example, the Middlesex County district sent $22,000 to two local charters that have enrolled former borough students. Next year, the board expects that number to jump to $300,000, she said. "That’s another cost we will have to deal with and another drain on the budget," said Saiff, who opposes a plan to open a third charter school in town.
Charter schools are becoming a hot issue in a growing number of communities and in elections across the state, said Lynne Strickland, executive director of the Garden State Coalition of Schools. "The more charter schools expand, the more people become concerned about them," said Strickland, who represents about 100 districts in mostly suburban communities. "Charter schools cost local taxpayers money, and it’s one budget item they have no say over."
Associate Press-The Record - NJ school elections less fiery a year after revolt
Star Ledger - If N.J. Supreme Court orders increased school aid, Gov. Christie says not complying is among ‘options’
Philadelphia Inquirer - Christie v. Court: Is threat for real?
He has considered ignoring N.J. justices if they order more school funding. Legal scholars said that would be a historic breach.
Star Ledger - Rhetoric less heated in N.J. school elections this year, experts say
Published: Saturday, April 23, 2011, 6:49 PM Updated: Sunday, April 24, 2011, 8:13 AM
By Jessica Calefati/The Star-Ledger The Star-Ledger
Frustrated over increases in school spending and property taxes during a down economy, New Jersey voters, at the urging of Gov. Chris Christie, rejected their local school budgets in record numbers last year.
The results could be a lot different this year, as voters head to the polls Wednesday to cast ballots on 538 spending plans, education experts and school officials said.
"Last year was all about sound bites — ‘Turn down the budget. Send a message’ — and this year it’s about reality," Assembly Education Committee chairman Patrick Diegnan (D-Middlesex) said. "Local school boards are faced with the insurmountable challenge of doing great things with fewer resources, and residents are starting to understand that."
The economy is still problematic, but it’s not as suffocating as last year, said Frank Belluscio, spokesman for the New Jersey School Boards Association. Most districts have proposed austere budgets, with price tags falling at or below the 2 percent property tax cap championed by Christie and signed into law last year.
Statewide, 11 districts will present voters with "second questions" on additional spending projects whose combined cost tops $3.3 million. Another 14 municipalities will, for the first time, ask voters to approve non-school spending ventures that exceed the new tax cap.
Proposed budgets in more than 60 municipalities exceed the 2 percent tax cap because the school districts have included expenses, such as health insurance, that fall outside the limit.
"It’s a calmer year," Belluscio said. "I think it gives the community a greater opportunity to focus on education goals and how to fulfill those goals."
Last year, voters approved just 41 percent of the proposed budgets — the lowest number since 1976 and a 30-point drop from 2009, when 73 percent of budgets passed. Voter turnout also spiked last year.
"We will certainly be above (last year’s) mark, but how much higher the approval rate will be is hard to determine because the economy remains a factor," Belluscio said.
Locked in a fiery debate with the New Jersey Education Association, the state’s largest teachers union, Christie last year called upon taxpayers to reject budgets in districts where teachers had refused to accept a pay freeze. This year, the governor has been mum on school budgets.
Christie spokesman Kevin Roberts said the governor still supports "shared sacrifice."
"New Jersey is still dealing with fiscal challenges, which is why we continue to support any efforts by districts, local employees and their leadership to responsibly and efficiently manage district budgets," Roberts said. "And that is what voters expect as well as they consider them for approval."
School boards are often asked to do the impossible — offer more services without raising taxes. A poll released last week by Quinnipiac University showed 59 percent of voters would rather cut services than raise taxes, while 71 percent oppose cuts in state aid to public schools.
The Hopatcong School District faces this dilemma every year, Superintendent Charles Maranzano said. Taxpayers in the Sussex County borough have approved the local school budget just three times in the past 20 years, most recently in 2004.
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"We have a long history of failed budgets," Maranzano said. "This is largely a bedroom community. There are no ratables in this town, and on top of that, a lot of people are out of work."
Maranzano said he is "cautiously optimistic" this year’s budget will be approved, but he understands voters’ frustration.
"Who could blame the taxpayers? We are all taxpayers," Maranzano said. "But once you reduce funding and resources for schools considerably, the quality becomes hard to maintain."
Taxpayers vent their rage in school elections because they don’t get to vote on much else that directly affects their taxes, said Bruce Baker, an associate professor at Rutgers University’s Graduate School of Education. Voters can voice their opinions on school budgets, but not on municipal, state or federal budgets.
"Budget approval historically has oscillated with public sentiment about the economy," Baker said. "1976 was the last time the economic indicators were roughly as bad as last year and as many budgets got voted down."
Wendy Saiff, president of the Highland Park Board of Education, said deciding which programs and services end up on the chopping block during tough economic times is "horrible."
"When a budget is cut, you live with those cuts for subsequent years," Saiff said. "When you cut off an appendage, it’s not growing back. It’s gone and you learn to live without it."
The growing costs of charter schools have become an increasingly visible issue in Highland Park, Saiff said. This year, for example, the Middlesex County district sent $22,000 to two local charters that have enrolled former borough students. Next year, the board expects that number to jump to $300,000, she said.
"That’s another cost we will have to deal with and another drain on the budget," said Saiff, who opposes a plan to open a third charter school in town.
Charter schools are becoming a hot issue in a growing number of communities and in elections across the state, said Lynne Strickland, executive director of the Garden State Coalition of Schools. "The more charter schools expand, the more people become concerned about them," said Strickland, who represents about 100 districts in mostly suburban communities. "Charter schools cost local taxpayers money, and it’s one budget item they have no say over."
Associate Press-The Record - NJ school elections less fiery a year after revolt
Saturday, April 23, 2011
The Record
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
HADDONFIELD — A year after a taxpayer revolt at the polls, New Jersey's school budget elections are back on Wednesday — with some major differences.
Proposed budget increases are more modest, largely because of a state law mandating that they be; Gov. Chris Christie isn't actively campaigning against budgets this time; and the election is being held on a Wednesday, an unfamiliar day for voting.
New Jersey is the only state where voters in most school districts get to vote up or down the entire school tax levy every year — a relatively rare opportunity for citizens to have a direct say on how much they're taxed. That sounds like a big chance for weary taxpayers to speak up in a state with by far the nation's highest average property tax bill of more than $7,300, the bulk of it to support schools.
But usually, the results are predictable: Turnout in the elections — where school board members are also elected — is tiny, usually well under 20 percent of registered voters. And a large majority of the proposed budgets are adopted in a state where scores on comparable standardized tests consistently rank among the nation's best.
Last year, it was reversed.
Christie, a Republican whose war of words with teachers unions is a hallmark of his governorship, campaigned against budgets last year. He said voters should reject proposals in districts where teachers didn't agree to pay freezes and increases in their health insurance payments.
It was only fair, he said, that they sacrifice.
Facing shrinking tax revenue and less federal education aid, his administration slashed subsidies to local school districts, leading to widespread layoffs and program cuts. Even the proposed budgets in many districts last year called for some cuts, and they ended up being deeper when voters rejected them (rejected budgets are sent to municipal governments to cut).
Voters heeded the governor's call and the situation by turning out — and voting "no" — in unusually high numbers. Nearly 27 percent of registered voters participated in the election — twice the percentage as the previous year. And they rejected nearly 60 percent of the budgets, the most since at least 1976.
But this year's circumstances are different.
Christie is proposing $250 million more in aid to be spread around to the state's schools, which takes some of the burden off the property taxes to fund schools. The money has also meant districts could avoid further cuts they were bracing for.
The class trip for eighth graders in Gloucester City, for instance, could be spared. And in the Chathams, the fee for extracurricular activities imposed a year ago is slated to be reduced.
It's also the first year of a law capping tax levy increases in most cases at 2 percent. That's down from a 4 percent limit last year. The state Education Department says only 9 of the 538 districts with budget elections have additional ballot questions for spending, including some items that would push the districts over their 2 percent caps.
"They're really striving to keep it low," said Frank Belluscio, a spokesman for the New Jersey School Boards Association. "They understand what's going on out there with the economy. There's been a real effort to keep it under 2 percent."
A Rutgers Eagleton poll conducted in late March and early April found voters hadn't given much thought to how they'll vote in the elections. Thirty percent said they'd vote yes, 16 percent no and 15 percent said they wouldn't bother to vote. The biggest group — about two in five — said they didn't know how they'd vote.
A year ago, there was a major push against the budget proposals. Christie wrote a newspaper editorial telling voters to reject any plan that didn't include "shared sacrifice," and educators in only about 20 districts agreed to the concessions he was pushing. Also, Christie's sparring with the New Jersey Education Association was making headlines practically daily in the run-up to voting.
This time, he isn't campaigning against budget plans.
NJEA spokesman Steve Wollmer said Christie was wrong to link layoffs, program cuts and increased student fees for extracurricular activities with teachers' refusals to accept contract concessions. The real problem, he said, was the cut in state aid.
"Last year, he obviously had an impact on both the turnout and the results," said Steve Wollmer, a spokesman for the NJEA. "He ran a misinformation campaign. People fell for it."
This year, no major opposition to budgets has surfaced.
The major campaign is just to remind voters when the election is. It's usually held on the third Tuesday in April. But former Education Commissioner Bret Schundler moved it to April 27 this year — the fourth Wednesday — to avoid conflicting with Passover.
Philadelphia Inquirer - Christie v. Court: Is threat for real?
He has considered ignoring N.J. justices if they order more school funding. Legal scholars said that would be a historic breach.
Just how powerful is he?
Gov. Christie said last week that he had mulled defying a possible order from New Jersey's Supreme Court to restore funding to schools.
The statement, on a call-in radio show, left legal scholars wondering whether this was the Republican governor just spouting threats and bluster - or foreshadowing an unprecedented break with tradition.
If Christie ignores the ruling, scholars said, he could be ruled in contempt of court and personally fined, he could be impeached for violating his oath of office, or he could trigger a constitutional crisis and the statewide closing of schools.
Or maybe nothing would result, and voters would be left to decide whether to reelect a governor who overruled the highest court in his state in the name of fiscal prudence.
To the Rutgers University faculty member who founded the group suing for more school funding, such defiance is so unfathomable it calls to mind the Arkansas governor who, 54 years ago, ignored the U.S. Supreme Court order to integrate public schools.
"In our system, one branch doesn't say to another: 'Sorry, you have acted in your authority, but I don't like your actions, so I don't have to follow it,' " said professor Paul Tractenberg. "Christie might not be literally standing in the schoolhouse doors and blocking them, but he's doing something very" similar.
The current case had its origins nearly 40 years ago. The nonprofit Education Law Center sued the state for more money for poor schools, saying equitable funding was a right under the state constitution because of a provision, approved by voters in 1875, mandating a "thorough and efficient" education.
Christie has argued that the resulting court rulings, known as Abbott decisions, have been a failure because poor districts get a disproportionate amount of state funding - and spend far more per student - yet still have abysmal graduation rates and standardized test scores.
In 2010, to close a yawning budget deficit, Christie eliminated $1 billion in school funding. He restored just $250 million in his proposed budget for the fiscal year that will begin in July.
Money, he argues, doesn't ensure students a good education. Instead, Christie has proposed to improve the lot of impoverished students by expanding charter schools, tying teacher tenure to students' academic performance, and rewarding educators in poor schools with higher salaries.
The Education Law Center has sued, saying the 2010 cuts violated the funding requirement set by the courts. Peter G. Verniero, a former Supreme Court justice who represents the Christie administration, has argued that the court must respect the separation of powers and allow the Legislature to handle spending.
In a decision expected in the coming weeks, the Supreme Court could mandate that Christie fork over as much as $1.7 billion. Its ruling could not be appealed to federal court.
If forced to pay, Christie said last week, he would not, "under any circumstances," raise taxes on an overtaxed public. He could cut spending, he said, but that would lead to the immediate closure of "many" hospitals, the layoff of police officers, and major cuts to Medicaid.
"These are ugly, ugly choices," he said Thursday night on the Ask the Governor show on New Jersey 101.5 FM.
The host then asked Christie if he could simply ignore the court's ruling.
"Well," he responded, "that's an option, too. . . . Have I thought of that? Of course I have."
Since he campaigned for office, Christie has railed against the court not only for its school-funding rulings but also for its requirements that municipalities provide affordable housing for the poor.
Judges "sound more like they're running for governor than trying to be a judge on a bench," he said on the radio show.
He called out Justice Barry T. Albin, who during a hearing on school funding last week brought up Christie's refusal to reinstate a so-called millionaire's tax, which some Democrats have said could help fund the schools.
"I've got to wonder what a nonelected justice of the Supreme Court - in the case that's supposed to be talking about constitutional issues - is doing bringing up any tax and advocating the raising of any tax . . . and then also declaring how that money should be spent once it's raised," Christie said.
Albin, he added, is a "perfect example of how unelected lifetime judges in our state have lost their sense of place in our democracy."
Taxes were brought up because of the inherent conflict in the school-funding case, said Rutgers-Camden law professor Robert F. Williams.
On one hand, New Jersey has a constitutional requirement to balance its budget, so available money supersedes spending mandates. On the other hand, the lack of money is, in part, a political decision that can be rectified by raising taxes or cutting spending.
Elected officials have repeatedly failed to reconcile this issue. In that sense, they have defied the court in much the same way that Christie has threatened, leaving justices to grapple with the Abbott case decade after decade, said David S. Cohen, professor at the Earle Mack School of Law at Drexel University.
"This is one of the big issues when the judiciary gets involved in major societal reform," Cohen said.
"As much as [justices] may have a correct interpretation of the state constitution and have the right legal and moral argument . . . they can't march into Christie's office or the Legislature and say, 'Do this or else,' " he said.
The only similar instance occurred in 1976, when the Legislature defied the court's orders in a related case on increasing school funding, resulting in the statewide closing of schools.
Fortunately, it was July, and in short order lawmakers and the governor passed the state's income tax to raise the needed money.
Christie's threat is taken seriously because he has shown a willingness to reject precedent. Last year, he did not reappoint Supreme Court Justice John Wallace Jr., a political moderate and the court's only African American. Instead he nominated a lawyer, Anne Patterson, whom the Democratic-controlled Senate won't confirm. It was the first time since New Jersey ratified its new constitution in 1947 that a justice had been denied tenure after a seven-year probationary period.
Former Republican Gov. Tom Kean once called a justice "communistic," according to Williams, yet renominated him because to do otherwise would "interfere with the independence of the court."
Kean didn't want justices to look "over their shoulders."
Now justices are "walking on eggshells," said Rutgers-Newark law professor Frank Askin. One justice, Helen E. Hoens, will be up for tenure during Christie's current term and is therefore "under the gun," Askin said.
Could the governor's statement last week just be a means of intimidation? And could the court's ruling show it worked?
"We will never know the answer to that question," Williams said, "but everyone will speculate about it, either way."
Contact staff writer Matt Katz
at 609-217-8355, mkatz@phillynews.com or @mattkatz00 on Twitter. Read the "Christie Chronicles" blog
at philly.com/christiechronicles.
Star Ledger - If N.J. Supreme Court orders increased school aid, Gov. Christie says not complying is among 'options'
Published: Friday, April 22, 2011, 7:45 AM Updated: Friday, April 22, 2011, 10:50 AM
By Ginger Gibson/Statehouse Bureau The Star-Ledger
TRENTON — Gov. Chris Christie said last night that he hasn’t ruled out defying the state Supreme Court if it orders him to spend more money on poor public school students.
During the “Ask the Governor” radio program on New Jersey 101.5, Christie was asked whether he could just ignore the court if it ruled against him — a prospect that could compel him to restore up to $1.7 billion in school aid.
“That’s an option,” Christie replied. “I’m not going to sit here and speculate. … There are a whole bunch of options in the contingency plan.”
Christie spokesman Kevin Roberts last night would not say how seriously the governor is considering not complying.
Christie went on the attack against the state Supreme Court, a day after it heard oral arguments about whether he violated the state constitution by cutting public school funding last year.
Christie also took aim at Associate Justice Barry Albin, singling him out as an example of how “judges have lost their sense of place in our democracy.”
During the court’s arguments over the state’s obligation to its poorest students, Albin asked twice about the decision to not renew a “millionaires tax” to raise revenue.
Christie, during the radio show, said Albin sounded more like a “candidate for governor” than a “tenured judge.”
“He was advocating yesterday to put his hand in the pockets of the taxpayer of New Jersey, take money out of it and determine himself how that money should be spent,” Christie said.
Paul Tractenberg, a Rutgers law professor and founder of the Education Law Center, which filed the lawsuit challenging the cuts, said Christie’s comments go far beyond the usual grumbling about the court’s decisions.
“I don’t think governors have ever said flat-out they were thinking of ignoring a court order,” he said. “We’d be in uncharted terrain … We essentially convert government into a dictatorship.”
Robert Williams, a Rutgers School of Law-Camden professor, said ignoring the court would prompt a constitutional crisis.
He said Christie has a track record of being hostile to the court.
“He’s campaigned against the court,” he said.
Winnie Comfort, spokeswoman for the judiciary, declined to comment about the possibility of Christie defying the court and said Albin declined to respond to the governor.
If he loses the case and opts to comply with the ruling, Christie predicted possible Draconian cuts, including closing hospitals and laying off firefighters and cops.
“I will not raise taxes under any circumstances,” he said.
Through spending cuts, Christie said there is a finite number of places he could go, such as hospital and municipal aid.
“You will see many hospitals across New Jersey close within a month,” Christie said of the possibility of cutting hospital aid. “They won’t be able to survive,”
Sen. Loretta Weinberg (DBergen) said Christie doesn’t have to cut aid to hospitals if he loses the school funding case.
“He can state he has no choice, but he does have other choices. The millionaires tax is an obvious one,” she said.
