School District Still Uncertain on Guidelines for Additional State Aid

Bernards Township school officials , but School Board President Susan Carlsson said the district still is waiting for details on how the money might be used.

Carlsson said on Wednesday she does not know yet how the district might apply funding to a budget already approved in April — and for which property tax rates have already been struck by the township and county.

Carlsson said the promised additional funding is likely to be discussed at a board finance subcommittee meeting next Monday, but she could not say how the board would react until the next anticipated full meeting in about two weeks.

"We may have to wait and see what we are going to do," Carlsson said. 

Late on Tuesday afternoon, Schools Superintendent Valerie Goger also said the district was waiting for direction from the state Department of Education.

New Jersey school districts on Tuesday learned more of the details about the extra state aid they will receive under Gov. Chris Christie’s final budget. But there's a twist: the administration wants most of them to use the money for property tax relief.

There still appeared to be some questions as to what actually will be required, if anything. But the governor's office said late in the day that suburban districts receiving extra aid would be "strongly" encouraged to apply the added aid to property tax relief and not necessarily to restoring cut programs.

“The additional education aid included in this year’s budget is an opportunity to reduce property tax burdens by lowering local property tax levies for this fiscal year or the next and move closer toward real reform in our schools," said Christie spokesman Kevin Roberts in a statement.

“The administration strongly encourages using this additional aid to lower taxes and make the important step toward new and effective management of our schools that focuses on improving student achievement, rather than increased spending.”

Ironically, the bulk of the additional $850 million in state aid was not going to tax relief. That's because it's headed to the state’s highest-poverty districts, per order of the state Supreme Court’s recent Abbott v. Burke ruling.

For the full story, click here.

The district learned in late February that it would receive a state increase of $777,000 for 2011-2012, bringing the total to about $1.6 million. The previous year, 2010-11, school state aid not dedicated to a particular program was cut to about $847,891.

Two years previously, the district had received $4 million in state aid, Carlsson said, partially because of an increase to reflect that the district was spending less than the amount per pupil that the state recommended was required to provide a thorough and efficient education for students. In 2009-10, the amount was about $3 million.

"There has to be a better way to fund school systems," Carlsson said on Wednesday. She said the district would have liked to know what its funding levels would be last fall and winter, when it was trying to plan a budget for the next school year.

She said she doesn't know whether the district could potentially use the money to fund a full-day kindergarten program, which was cut out of next year's budget when school officials feared that aid would stay below than $1 million.

Linda Sadlouskos contributed to this story.