Schools push for tax hike
Saying that years of budget cuts are taking their toll on Newburyport's schools, the School Committee is proposing that the city adopt its first override of Proposition 2 1/2 to infuse $1.6 million into the district.
The plan, which is being actively promoted by a newly formed ballot committee, faces its first hurdle Monday when the City Council considers the School Committee's request to schedule a special election in late May on the override.
"We've had at least four years of significant budget reductions at the Newburyport school district" with additional cuts looming for next year, said School Committee member Mark Wright, also a member of the ballot committee, which is named Yes For Newburyport. He said override supporters "are hopeful we can convince the rest of the community that there is a need for additional investment for the school system."
Newburyport has never placed an override on the ballot. Voters have approved two previous debt exclusions, for the library and high school building projects. An override allows a community to permanently exceed its tax cap by a specific amount. A debt exclusion allows it to exceed the cap for a specified period of time to repay debt on a project.
The override proposal comes as the School Committee is weighing a plan offered by Superintendent Kevin M. Lyons to eliminate a projected $1.5 million fiscal 2008 budget shortfall. The plan calls for significant restructuring -- including closing an elementary school and converting another to an early-childhood center -- and cutbacks. Overall, about 35 positions would be eliminated.
Wright said he anticipates the School Committee will support going forward with at least some of the proposed restructuring even if an override were to pass. That would allow for the bulk of the override revenues to go toward restoring some of the past cuts and to begin investing in initiatives that Lyons proposed in a district improvement plan last December.
City Council president Thomas F. O'Brien said it is too early to tell how the council might act on the request to schedule the override election.
"I just think we need more information," he said. "I want to see what they are asking for, what's in this $1.6 million."
Wright said the School Committee is set to vote on its budget, based on current anticipated revenues, in early April. At that time, it also will outline how it would make use of the additional $1.6 million that would come from the override.
The override would add a little more than $200 to the annual $5,045 tax bill of a median home valued at $488,000, according to Mayor John Moak, who supports the ballot question.
Moak, who also chairs the School Committee, said that Lyons has "scrutinized the budget extremely well" and offered ideas on "how we can make the system run more efficiently.... With that in mind, I'm willing to support an override because I know how much we've lost in our educational programs in the last four years.
"I'm willing to say to people, we do need to support our educational system. It's going to be a burden on our taxpayers, but a burden that I think is worthwhile," he said.
According to Wright, the ballot committee is gathering signatures on a petition to submit to the City Council in support of the request to schedule a ballot vote.
"We feel Newburyport is at the tail end of a successive number of cuts that have done tremendous harm," said Ken Okaya, a ballot committee member. "We felt enough was enough, that all cuts that could be made had been made, that there was nowhere we could go other than to advocate for an override."
The reorganization plan, meanwhile, is itself a topic of lively discussion in the city. Under it, the Kelley School, the smallest of the city's three kindergarten-to-fourth grade schools, would close. Of the remaining two, the Brown School would become a citywide early-education center, housing preschool and kindergarten, and the Bresnahan School would become a citywide school for first to third grades.
The Nock Middle School, currently fifth to eighth grade, would become sixth to eighth grade. A new citywide upper elementary school, comprising fourth and fifth grades, would be housed in the Nock building.
Lyons said the reorganization, projected to save $659,000, was proposed for financial reasons. "But there are some benefits that would accrue that happen to parallel some of the ideas at least indirectly that I put forward" in the improvement plan.
He said, for example, that situating all teachers from common grade levels together would enhance their ability to work together, strengthening curriculum and instruction.
Okaya said that "a lot of people are saddened" by the possible changes, but "I think the people I've spoken with largely believe community schools are simply a luxury we can't afford now in Newburyport. And many see the benefits of having the same grades in one building."
