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Our
Bay County School System is wrestling with some serious budget
concerns. In the Sunday edition of the News Herald (July 13), Alvin
Peters laid down a challenge seeking alternative solutions to how the
system can absorb a 20.4 million dollar reduction from the 07-08 budget
year to the 08-09 year. Time is short. People in and out of the school
system are worried. Mr. Peters says it isn't so simple
when you get into the nuts and bolts of the district's spending. So,
I've decided to weigh in on the subject.
First,
let me assure you that I won't be shooting from the hip. I did spend
eight years of my younger life (and it made me older) as an elected
school board member in another state. We had a number of
budget woes too. In fact, it was a serious budget crisis resulting in a
24 teacher lay-off that prompted me to throw my hat into the ring and
run for the office. (On a side note, I was paid three dollars a month
to serve my school district. We considered it true public service.
Hmmm, could that be a source of funds to be reduced from the budget?)
Here's
my story. Our district had just constructed a new gymnasium with an
indoor running track. The facility seats four thousand spectators. It's
a first class structure. But it really didn't sit well with the public
when we were told that we had construction dollars to build the place,
but not enough money to operate the school system in the following
year. Whoops. I think I've heard that in the recent past here in Bay
County.
Long
story short, I've been to the Bay County Schools Web site and
downloaded a copy of the executive level budget document. It doesn't
contain a lot of detail, but I think it has enough information for me
to make a few suggestions. I've just started, but I hope to have a lean
budget recommendation by the end of the week. Perhaps I'll be ready to
share my insights in next weeks PCityLive column. We'll see.
I'm
really motivated to get this done. Mr. Peters put a $50 bounty offer to
those of us willing to accept the challenge to "Effect $20 million in
cuts to the general revenue portion of the Bay County school budget
without detracting from the quality of public education."
I
don't think it will be too tough. Satisfying the specification of not
"detracting from the quality of public education" is the first point of
attack. How can anyone really know if cuts made affect public education
over one-year period. Or for that matter, how could anyone argue
factually that the school system did not actually improve over a one
year period because of the cuts. It's all pretty fuzzy stuff, FCAT not
withstanding.
Let's see. How can I spend my fifty bucks?
Image courtesy of foundphotoslj & used under the creative commonse license.
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