School Elections

New Jersey’s Annual School Elections are today with districts deciding the fate of school budgets and in some cases selecting representatives to their local Board of Education. Last year nearly 25% of registered voters in Ocean County cast ballots which was much higher than in previous years. The interest was in part sparked by the bleak economic state of affairs in New Jersey and Governor Christie’s battle with the New Jersey Education Association. Only 11 of 28 school districts in the county passed their budgets which was considerably less than 2009 when 23 spending plans were approved. What really stood out was that most of the larger districts overwhelmingly rejected their budgets with only Toms River, Southern Regional and Stafford able to overcome that trend and get voter approval. It certainly seemed that the bigger turnout was made up by those who clearly were heading to the polls to vote no.

There is no reason to expect a different outcome today but at the very least you would hope that voters are somewhat informed as they step into the booth. The bottom line is many will take out their frustrations today because it’s the only time they get a say in how their taxes are spent and in these times its hard to blame those who simply reject anything they feel will cost them more money. However if they have done some research they may find their district has taken the current state of affairs into consideration and is presenting pretty much a bare-bones budget. Many include administrative wage freezes, personnel cutbacks, significant cuts to programs and extracurricular activities and more. For this reason there will be districts that are presenting budgets that don’t call for any tax increase or ones that are quite small…although again any increase to some is simply not acceptable.

However until our state is able to find another way to fund education besides property taxes this is the system we are stuck with. If you feel your districts has done their homework and is presenting a fair budget then it deserves your support…even if you don’t have school-aged children. If you have children in school and don’t support the local budget then you will have nobody to blame if your kids have to walk further to and from school and they are home early because the extracurricular program they used to be involved in has been cut.

As for those running for the Board of Education they deserve some credit right off the bat for giving their time and effort to a volunteer position that often comes with little reward. Here’s hoping the ones doing it for the right reasons prevail today.