Moving School Board Election

A New Jersey State Senate committee is expected to vote today on bill S-1861which would move school board elections from April to the November general election and also eliminate the need for the public to approve local school budgets that are below the state cap. While this bill is far from perfect I think it’s a major step in the right direction and I’m in favor of a change that’s been talked about for years.

School Board members are for the most part dedicated individuals who try and make a difference. However since the April turnout is so small it doesn’t take many votes for someone to get elected to a position of power even if they are running for the wrong reasons. With more people voting in November you would think that the quality candidates have a better chance of getting their message across. Those opposed to the move, including the New Jersey Education Association and the New Jersey School Boards Association cite among their reasons the fear that partisan politics will come into play. It might be a fair concern if you are naïve enough to believe that politics doesn’t play into the current system because it does. The NJEA has never been one of my favorite groups…they want to win all the time and compromise is not one of their favorite words.

The other major provision of this bill has to do with the elimination of voting on the school budget and to me this is the biggest reason for it to go into effect. To often the public took out their frustrations over high taxes by voting against budgets even if they were frugal and deserving of support. You don’t vote on where any of your other tax dollars go so why should education have to take the brunt of dissatisfaction? If the proposed budget stays within the state cap then there is no vote….however if it exceeds it then the public will decide its fate each November.

Like I said this bill is not perfect and the November date does cause some hardship because the school year is already underway. However that’s not reason enough and in time everyone will learn to work around that. Plus the state is expected to save about $5 million by merging the two election dates and that money can be better put to other use. Even if S-1861 gets through committee today it’s still got a couple of hurdles before it could be signed by Governor Corzine and it would not go into effect until 2010. It’s a change whose time has come.