Council, School Board Hold Early Joint Session On FY2012 Budget

By Carla Branch
alexandrianews.org

On Nov. 23, the Alexandria City Council will provide budget guidance to City Manager Jim Hartmann on preparing the fiscal year 2012 operating budget, which will include a spending cap for the Alexandria School Board. Last night, the School Board and Council held a joint work session to discuss the Alexandria City Public School system’s needs.

“We have seen our budget decline and our enrollment grow over the past two years, and we have done a good job with the resources we have been given,” said School Board Chair Yvonne Folkerts. “We have realigned 15% of our budget and now put more than 75% of that budget directly into our schools and classrooms.

“We have placed modular classrooms at two of our elementary schools and plan to place them at three others so that we can continue to use our buildings. Still, by 2015, we are going to have a deficit of 40 classrooms in elementary school and, with that growth, it is only a matter of time before we will need additional space at middle and high school.

“During the past two years, while our budget has declined and our enrollment grown, student achievement has improved. Every No Child Left Behind subgroup has shown improvement on every Virginia Standards of Learning test, some of those groups dramatic improvement. Also, more students than ever before participated in AP classes at T. C. Williams, and more students achieved a passing score of 3, 4 or 5 on the AP test than they have since 2005. We have work to do on our SAT and ACT tests, and T. C. Principal Suzanne Maxey has a plan that should lead to improvement.

“While we don’t yet have a budget number for you, there are very few places where we can make budget cuts. We want our school system to continue to improve, and we are going to need resources to make that happen. The superintendent won’t present his proposed budget to us until January, but we got very concerned when we heard that Council was considering a two-percent increase as our cap. I just don’t know how we can continue the good work we have begun with that increase,” Folkerts said.

Mayor Bill Euille talked about Council’s budget guidance. “We have not yet given the city manager any budget guidance. That will happen next week. The only thing we have set as a goal is not to raise our residential real estate tax rate. We have a projected revenue increase of $19 million, and we believe that should cover additional expenditures on both the City and school side of the budget.

“We have raised the real estate tax rate in each of the past two years, and our goal is to leave it the same this year. That doesn’t mean that we might not be convinced to do something else, but right now it is our goal,” Euille said.

In FY2011, ACPS received $167 million from the City, just over 78% of its entire budget. According to figures provided by the School Board, with a 5% increase in the City appropriation, ACPS must reduce or realign from $1.2 to $7.1 million in existing activities. A 4% increase in the City appropriation would require reductions of $2.8 to $8.8.

“Knowing our needs, I don’t understand why you would start with the premise that you aren’t going to raise taxes,” said Board Member Mimi Carter. “That seems backwards to me.”

During her campaign for School Board in April, 2009, Carter said something entirely different. “This week the Alexandria City Council was forced to raise taxes AND cut spending in order to close a significant budget shortfall,” she said. “Because these financial trends are expected to continue, additional funding for new programs is extremely unlikely. So while candidates can propose any program they want, without identifying a funding source, their ideas will likely come to naught.

“That’s what sets me apart. Not only have I identified programs to improve learning, I have also identified several ways for ACPS to save money in order to pay for them.

“The most significant savings would come from responsibly reducing our non-teaching labor costs, which account for 85% of the ACPS budget (the national average is 62%). Simply reducing labor costs to 80% of the budget would free up $10 million a year – more than enough for the new programs I’ve proposed: universal preschool, mentoring programs, enhanced curriculum, more bilingual staff and more,” Carter said during her campaign.

Vice Mayor Kerry Donley responded to Carter’s comments last night. “Even if we don’t raise the real property tax rate, taxes are going to go up because residential and commercial property values are going up. It is our goal not to raise the rate, because we are still facing economic difficulties,” he said.

Councilman Frank Fannon also spoke in favor of not raising taxes. “Not raising taxes is a laudable goal and one that we should keep in mind as we go through this process,” he said.

Euille agreed. “While we are very supportive of the public schools, we must balance the needs of the schools with the needs of the rest of the city,” he said. “It is our job to make those very hard choices.”

Board Member Charles Wilson said the city wasn’t doing enough. “According to the State’s formula, Alexandria can afford to do more for the schools. We aren’t spending as much of our budget on the public schools as other jurisdictions in the region, and we can afford to do much more than some of them,” he said.

According to the Washington Area Boards of Education, Alexandria spends 31% of its budget on the public schools, while Fairfax county spends 53% and Arlington, 37%. “The composite index is a very complicated formula that requires us to provide around 80% of the school system’s budget, while the State share has continued to decrease,” Donley said. “We have been very good partners with the School Board, and that is going to continue, but you must remember that while your funds from the State and federal government are decreasing, so are funds for transportation and other services that we must provide.”

School Board Member Arthur Peabody asked Council not to think in terms of budget targets and caps. “You should be focused on the needs of the students who attend our schools, not on budget targets and caps; that’s just a distraction from the real issue, which is what will it take to provide a quality education for every child,” he said.

Council will vote on budget guidance at the legislative meeting next Tuesday.