WPCNR SCHOOL DAYS. News & Comment By John F. Bailey.January 20,2010: Tonight at the Slater Center, the White Plains Board of Education will stage its second Budget Planning Process forum at the Slater Center, 2 Fisher Court, 7:30 P.M. Last week the first session was held at White Plains High School drawing about 75 persons, including teachers and school district personnel.
In looking at the state budget proposed by Governor David Paterson yesterday, and judging the information provided by the school district last week, property taxpayers in White Plains can be assured that because the school district did not cut more expenses last year when they had the opportunity, district taxpayers will be paying whopper tax increases this year in the White Plains School District.
A preliminary runthrough by WPCNR shows the district is looking at a $50 increase in the tax rate – unless a miracle occurs. The district is looking at a $201 Million budget based on preliminary figures.
At last week's meeting at the high school, no preliminary budget was passed out, and citizens were asked to comment on areas and issues concerning the budget. One of the most telling comments came toward the end of the meeting, when one spectator asked how the audience could make serious suggestions where to cut the budget when the district had not presented a preliminary budget to them. The Superintendent of Schools (Dr. Christopher Clouet) promised that a preliminary budget would be ready in February.
Here’s why the largest combined tax increases in memory are going to hit us, unless the school district goes to work and cuts expenses deep:
* The Governor went on record yesterday saying he was going to make the whopping cut in the STAR Exemption of 18% he wanted to enact last year, but compromised to an 11% cut instead. However, the 18% cut is back in his budget this year.
By the way, WPCNR was the only media that chose to report this last year. The STAR EXEMPTION cut was deftly and deliberately hidden by the Governor and the legislature last year, and it was quietly used to “fund-through-the-taxpayer” the “restoration” of school aid much lauded last spring by the legislators themselves. Local legislators denied knowledge of this legislative sleight of hand, blaming it on the Office of Real Property Services.
But the Governor is very upfront about it in yesterday’s presentation to the legislature. The effect is to tax you upfront with an increase in tax even before the school budgets are passed. The problem is declining home and business property values are going to reduce assessments anyway delivering what WPCNR predicts will be the largest school tax increase we have seen in years unless sanity returns to the school district in some way.
White Plains Assistant Superintendent for Business Fred Seiler outlined the following cost increasers he expects will affect the budget. His numbers indicated expected increases as follows to be added to this year’s $185,778,149 school budget:
* $3.225 Million in Salary Increases for Teachers, Administrators and CSEA members.
* $2.8 Million Teacher Retirement Fund Increase
* $700,000 in Employee Retirement Increase
* $3.3 Million in health Insurance Increases (expected 10%)
Total New Budget adding these increases: $196 Million.
However, what Seiler did not allude to was the effect of a possible drop of $3 Million in the Assessment Roll causing a $1.5 Million drop in revenue.
Say the assessment roll goes down a mere $3 Million to $283.8 Million, this will roll up the budget impact another $1.5M, plus a $3.5 Million in School Aid Loss for White Plains, according to recent governor estimates, bringing a possible total budget of $201 Million.
$1,000 school tax increase for the median home?
Such an increase, $185.8 Million to $201 Million unless the district cuts expenses ruthlessly, would result in a tax rate of approximately $567/ $1,000 of assessed valuation. A median home owner under 65 of a house assessed at $18,475 would pay an increased school property tax of $9,095 up from about $8,000 in 09-10—about a $1,000 increase. Those whose homes are over the median would of course pay more.
Refresher in the STAR EXEMPTION
Here’s how the STAR EXEMPTION will work if the legisalature retains the 18% STAR CUT.
If you’re under 65 and own a median-priced home in White Plains, ($650,000) your STAR EXEMPTION for an $18,500 accessed home currently at $2,960 this year declines another $532.80 to $2,427, increasing your assessed value to $16,048. At this year’s school tax rate this means an automatic tax increase of $275 PLUS whatever money the school district needs to make up, jacking the average median property homeowner’s tax before the school district even begins to add on its increased expenses.
The person over 65 owning a median priced home currently with a $5,790 STAR EXEMPTION, gets creamed with the 18%, losing $1,042 reducing the amount of their STAR EXEMPTION to $4,748—that jumps the over-65er homeowner property tax $537 up from the $6,534 they are paying this year.
On top of that, do you own a home valued at over $1.4 Million? Well you lose your STAR EXEMPTION completely. The governor’s budget eliminates the STAR Exemption for homes valued over $1.4 Million. That’s a lot more taxes for you millionaire home owners out there.
Concepts to ponder:
At a recent seminar held January 11 at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., blueprints for the school district of the future were discussed by Steven Wilson of Ascend Learning and John Chubb of the Edison Learning Institute before a group of assembled educators. The two presented papers that challenged the shibboleths of education today, including the belief that small class size increases achievement(not demonstrated by research), and challenged districts to use more technology to instruct students in new media, stratify classes according to achievement, among other practices that have been successful in the most successful school systems around the world including charter schools.
The eye-opening conference may be viewed on C-Span at
