Dawn McCravey’s appeal for additional “support” of the Northshore School District budget should require not just a careful look at support, but also scrutinize just how that money is spent, and what are all the factors influencing its educational product.
The lavish spending evident by just visiting their sites makes clear the administration building and the newly refurbished stadium make clear that amount of money available has little limiting influence, and that is made clear just by visiting the restrooms in the former.
Also the recent buying of audio-visual equipment brought home for personal use by staff members indicates abundance can easily be taken advantage of.
And then there is the fact that government mandates are responsible for the district having to teach more and more “students with complex learning needs.” Essentially the district acts as a baby-sitting service for many students unable to speak or go to the bathroom on their own. In addition, governmental policies of winking at and encouraging illegal and legal immigration has brought ever-larger numbers of non-English speaking students.
These actions cost the educational process a great deal of money, and continue to take up an ever-growing segment of middle-class taxpayer support for education. There are many aspects to the effects of this. On the one hand, services for someone like disabled children have a federal agency tracking their progress, and federal monies are funneled into districts in order to supposedly improve the “test” scores of the lowest achieving students. The result has been to dry up money available for the highest achieving, or “gifted” students, as states divert money in order to meet federal mandates necessitating larger numbers of “special-needs” students. In some of these cases, mandates are made with the assumption that local taxpayers will bear the burden, as evidenced by districts pushing for more state aid for them.
Politicians can pass measures that act as “magnets” rewarding attracting cheap immigrant labor, but fail to provide the full cost it incurs. Northshore money-needs grow, and middle-class taxpayers bear the brunt of impacts, especially as the growing population creates a fewer-housing-supply-and-increased demand inflation.
The Northshore School District, like most districts, initially took these federal and state mandate laws and dollars as a way to augment its educational power and influence. And it won’t refuse any source of dollars, and wails woefully when any kind of belt-tightening is even hinted at.
It is up to the citizens to find a way to say “no” to irresponsible and expensive mandates.
Teachers demand ever-larger pay and benefits while district dollars move toward the lowest educational common denominator that brings marginal standardized test results, and ever-more screeching appeals for more money.
History makes clear that districts may experience some short-term discomfort with a levy failure, but gain credence because they also end up looking a little more seriously at how the spend.
It may be time to say “no” to local levies, and to scrutinize closely how money is spent and the large increases in real-estate taxes over the last 40 years.
Richard Pelto, Kenmore
