Pass The Budget, Not the Buck

There are more things that you can't do as a school board member in New Jersey than there are things you can do. Aside from selecting a superintendent, you can't hire anyone and you can't fire anyone. You can't interact with school personnel, and you can't see a sample lesson plan before you approve the school curriculum. Etc., etc. But what you can do is pass a budget. 

With each passing year, as more school policies are dictated by the state, school board members have less impact on the direction of their districts. Board members are told that they can't even have input into whether or not the district will "track" students into advanced, general, or remedial classes or use differentiated instruction within the classroom (more on this in another post).

But board members still hold the purse strings - if they have resolve.

Here are the keys:

• Be vocal in public about what you want and don't want in the budget
• Signal that you will vote No if there are items that are objectionable
• Hold the superintendent accountable for adhering to the budget you pass

As I explained many times at board meetings over the years, aside from some broad categories where monies must remain segregated (capital expenses, maintenance, and cafeteria funds to name a few), much of the budget, once approved, is left to the superintendent to manage.

This is why I always tried to refer to the budget as a "budget plan". It is the opportunity for the board members to stand up and fix their priorities - if not in stone, then at least in an Excel spreadsheet. And then hold the administration accountable. 

We know that there are times when funds will have to be moved from one account to another during the year to cover unplanned expenses - but the administration should always be seeking consent, if not formal approval, for these changes.

My experience on the board taught me that once the budget was passed it was promptly forgotten. Unless...unless board members were vocal in public at budget time about what they wanted. It's not easy. Superintendents generally do not have any regard for the priorities of the board. Several years ago when board members wanted to add three additional guidance counselors at the elementary school level we said so at a public meeting. It wasn't easy. 

About ten years ago when the Operations Committee of the board still had the primary responsibility of hammering out the budget with the superintendent, the committee asked for changes to the superintendent's recommended budget. The superintendent wasn't happy about this and ultimately prepared two budgets - one labeled as the district budget, the other as the Operations Committee budget! 

How far we have fallen! Fifteen years ago the Finance Committee of the board held up the budget for weeks because we objected to a $6000 expenditure that we found unnecessary. Nowadays, with an item that small, the administration would probably just buy it anyway no matter what the board's wishes because it was needed. For whatever. Board members, don't let that happen.

Who Do You Represent?

In the United States, it's pretty much universally accepted that elected representatives of the people are in their positions to represent the people that elected them.

Except if you are a school board member in New Jersey.

Most school administrators that I came in contact with during my fifteen-plus years as a school board member would tell you that a board member's constituents are the students of the district. The official position of the New Jersey School Boards Association (a group that SHOULD be advocating for school board members, but doesn't) is that board members are not representatives of the people in their communities, but rather are "agents of the state".

Did you really think that the State of New Jersey would invest any actual power in 5,000 normal citizens?

It seems that the school board elections are only to give the sad saps of New Jersey the ILLUSION that someone will be representing their interests. Try as they might, good school board members are prevented from doing this at every turn. From Curriculum to Covid, it's always the same - the state and the school administrators will push things along and school board members are only there for cover. And the NJSBA is there to keep the train rolling. No other reason.

I questioned this every year I was on the board. There are no rational answers. If school board members are not permitted to represent the public then why have elections at all? The county superintendents could certainly look at the resumes of candidates from each district and appoint whomever they wish. There is no answer to this.

Why are school board members constantly, CONSTANTLY, informed by the NJSBA that they have no individual power, but only as a group? Why do board members need to be told that? That situation is no different than any other elected body - from a township committee to the NJ Assembly to the US Congress - yet no other group needs to be reminded that their power is only as a group. There is no answer forthcoming.

This frustration is not at all limited to right-leaning board members. Believe me when I tell you that there is an equal number of newly-elected board members from the left side of the aisle who are just as frustrated.

In a future post, I will try to give some Hillsborough-specific examples.