Archive: Opinions

It’s springtime, so it’s time for a new Lansing Central School Budget Sales Campaign. But what educational achievements could possibly be worth the high-end price tag? That’s spelled out in the Mission Statement: “We will inspire our students to be knowledgeable, responsible, healthy and compassionate citizens.” And since children are inspired by the actions of adults, especially those in a position of trust, let’s deconstruct this mission statement by comparing it to the Lansing Central School Budget process.

Inspiring students to be knowledgeable (well-informed) citizens: Knowledge of the actual workings of the Lansing School budget is definitely NOT encouraged. The costs of textbooks, specialized equipment, salaries, etc. for each department are submitted to the administration and reclassified into a useless mass of “Contractual Expenses,” “Non-Instructional Salaries” and “Materials & Supplies” in a report which seems designed to prevent public scrutiny and challenge. The School District Budget Notice is another excellent example. While last year’s mailing presented thirty separate figures on the budget vote, not one of them was the proposed tax increase.

And yet, if there’s one number the taxpayers want and deserve to know, it’s the school tax increase. Maybe it’s because the Proposed Budget Increase shown was only 2.06%, while the Actual Tax Increase was 6.7% or 325% the reported Budget increase. The School Budget presentations are equally skewed - comparing only those things which can be made to support the proposed budget and its rationale, and suppressing all other facts and viewpoints. One high placed Administration person told me that if taxpayers were allowed to see all the information without “adjustments,” they might make the wrong decisions. The Lansing Central School’s definition of “well-informed” is better suited to a dictatorship than a democratic forum.

Inspiring students to be responsible (answerable or accountable for something within one's management) citizens: Responsibility for the ever increasing tax burden is the last thing that Lansing’s school leaders will accept or acknowledge. Every Budget Presentation is filled with excuses, blaming State and Federal Mandates, blaming Increased Costs, and of course blaming AES. Our school leaders seem to feel no responsibility to implement cost savings plans of any real substance. Nor is there any search for creative or innovative solutions. Their attitude is clearly shown in the recent Advocacy (PowerPoint) presentation, where the “=” equal sign was used to designate the shifting of the entire burden of any shortfall to the backs of Lansing’s taxpayers. “If they don’t pay it, you will” – is the Lansing Budget “Mandate.” This is the reasoning of entitlement: They’re entitled to the best, so they are “forced” to use any means they can to get it. What sort of responsible leadership claims that they’re not responsible for their own decisions and actions?

Inspiring students to be compassionate (having or showing compassion, accompanied by a strong desire to alleviate the suffering of others) citizens: The Tax Cap Video on the Lansing Central School website proclaims: “The tax levy is just a number. School leaders still do what they have always done…weigh the cost for providing a quality school program with the community’s ability to pay.”  What they have always done? School boards in the past routinely increased class sizes and refrained from buying new books and equipment to reduce excessive spending – something that could never be allowed in today’s climate of self worth. What does the ability to pay mean? That people should cut back on food, heat and medicine to get the money to pay for “educational” luxuries? The community’s ability to pay has never been a factor in any of Lansing School Budget decisions in recent years that I know of. Anyone who has inherited land or a house, or worked a lifetime to pay off their mortgage, and is living on a small income knows the pain of paying a large percentage of this income for property taxes.  In some states there is a “Circuit Breaker” program to prevent this, but not in New York. New York is a state which is unwilling to cap the school taxes, but readily caps the school tax relief to the poor and elderly taxpayers. In this country, where the per pupil spending has more than doubled in the past forty years, even accounting for inflation, the solution to every educational problem resolves itself into spending more money. And the continuing failure of past educational programs only results in demands for new programs with even greater funding requirements. Compassion is no more than lip-service, one of the “sounds good” slogans of the Lansing Central School System. There isn’t a particle of compassion in the entire school budget.

The teachers, administration, and School Board of the Lansing Central School System claim to be a caring, sharing community, but their tax demands spiral up and up, compounding at an ever increasing rate – 4.3% three years ago, 5.5% two years ago, and 6.7% last year, in a competition with neighboring towns to entitle their children with the most worldly goods. It’s knowledge of this reality that is systematically suppressed. It’s the responsibility for this taxation that is adamantly denied. And it’s compassion for the over-burdened people in their “community” that is noticeably lacking. If you inspire by example, how can this inspire your children to do anything but the same? The Lansing Central School Budget process teaches all the wrong things - the belief that some people are more important than others, that the world does owe them a living, and that anything they do to get their entitlement is justified.

Do we inspire our students to be knowledgeable, responsible, and compassionate citizens?  No, that’s been cut from the curriculum – for budgetary reasons.

Sincerely,

Doug Baird
Lansing
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