By JOSEPH KELLARD
Considering that budgets in Oceanside have passed by large margins in recent years, school officials were surprised that residents gave the latest proposal a thumbs-down last week.
The school board returned to the budget drawing board at its regular meeting on Monday to discuss its options: either putting to a vote the same budget or a revised version, or going to a contingency budget. The board has proposed a $96.8 million contingency budget, representing a 5.9 increase over the current budget, in which it would reduce or cut certain items from the original proposal.
Among the numerous areas in the budget that can be reduced or cut are athletic teams, intramural or co-curricular clubs, and staff, such as custodians, kitchen workers, administrative employees and kindergarten aides, Board of Education President Sue Graham said.
"It is not required by law that we have kindergarten aides," she said when asked if eliminating teachers was an option. "We can do that if need be, but we can't just eliminate a teacher. An option is that we could increase class sizes, which involves putting more students in one class, and that requires less teachers. At that point, they would be excessed."
While the district will consider cutting night-school and summer-school programs, Graham said that it doesn't "want to touch anything educational if it means it would affect the daily education of our children."
Oceanside's budget, which failed by a mere 10 votes, 1,028 to 1,018, was one of dozens of Long Island school budgets voted down May 18. Many said they were blindsided by the depth of opposition to the $99.4 million budget, which was an 8.6 increase over the current budget. "The board had no inkling that the community was upset or that this was coming," said Graham. "We had little attendance at our budget hearings, which leads us to believe that people are satisfied."
Graham and others in the district, including Superintendent Dr. Herb Brown, characterized the actions of Oceansiders and many other communities that voted down their budgets as "a tax revolt."
Addressing Long Island's near-record increases in school spending, Graham said that anyone on a fixed income or a reduced salary or who is unemployed is "certainly going to think twice when budgets are increased like they have been." Asked about others who might be worried, she added, "I think there was a lot of concern about the economic situation in a variety of ways, whether it's 9/11, gas prices, health insurance, and especially the reassessments in the county. Unfortunately, everyone's being hit. It's a very bad time."
One resident, who declined to give his name, summed up his talks with other Oceansiders who voted no, particularly senior citizens, by explaining that they were starting to feel burdened by taxes. "Right now, with gas prices so high and the cost of living on Long Island already high, [the school budget] is at least one area that voters can control," he explained. "... The schools are needed, but they can't vote against the gasoline tax, they can't vote against this other stuff. The budget is something they can vote against."
The areas of the budget's greatest increases were salaries, up by $2.7 million, health insurance, by $138,523, and contributions to employee retirement, by $35,694. After approving a $31 million bond in January 2003 to fund a district-wide capital-improvement project, Oceanside residents voted, in part, against the $2.5 million added to the budget that represents the startup cost for this 20-year bond.
Resident Mark Vale voiced his opposition to the district's budgeting practices at the final budget hearing on May 10, arguing against its decision to build new classrooms at the middle school and high school as part of the capital-improvement project. "The district is wasting money," Vale said. "They have a big, underutilized school at Merle they can use, and cut back on their spending or do other things with it. Instead, they're continuing to build more classrooms at Boardman, a school that was built on marshland and has been sinking ever since. It doesn't make sense."
Vale, who voted against the budget, argues that teachers themselves should pay more in health care like the private sector does, and that the percentage of students that pass the regents is too low for the amount of money the district spends per student. "To me, that 78 percent of the students pass the regents is low if you're spending about $13,000 per student," he said. "If you're spending that much on a student when, for example, a school like Chaminade spends about $5,000 a year per student, you should have more students passing."
In last Tuesday's election, school board trustees Bob Transom and Maryann Lehrer ran uncontested and won three-year terms.
