The 2006-7 Budget

[Go Plainedge!]

Ed:

Unfortunately, I can interpret that PowerPoint slide show as a negative. People may look at that slide show and POSSIBLY conclude that they don't need to vote YES for the budget because "look at everything that was accomplished on last years contingency budget".

That slide show may work against the goal.

[justfacts]

GoPlainedge!

Your most recent post quotes from the Plainedge District site where they state they are defined as only able to do what the (approved) Budget plan allows during the coming year.

The State Education Department laws also state this (SED Law 1718)

However, you have noticed that for the year 2004/5 where the voters called for a second vote that reduced the spending limit of the budget by $500,000 - they first reported and were audited for, spending to that limit. Then they quietly changed the numbers on Feb 28th this year to say they spent $619,000 more than the approved budget amount!

You then ask why they were able to spend more than the allocated budget.

The answer is simple - because they could! The BOE, who should have been monitoring expenditures each month during the year permitted them to do this - or they were lied to by the Administration. Which is worst - that's fraud!

The community, when the numbers were changed in February, did nothing to protest. They could have filed a Section 310 appeal with the Commissioner of Education (it's too late now) or they could ask the Comptroller, Mr. Hevesi, to audit that year's expenses. That action can still be done!

Until the BOE or the Community takes action with Hevesi, demanding an accounting for this overspending - nothing will be done and the Administration can continue to violate Budget spending limits! It's that simple - they can get away with it in Plainedge!

And there is no reason that they can't do the same thing this year![/i]


Ed.


Make sure the budget money goes to the Children's programs!

[gopybl]

Momma3 - I also received that same statement....It states that the assessed value of my home is 444,590 and will go up to 579,650 for the 07/08 tax year.... I think this statement came from the Receiver of Taxes James Stefanavich.....I could be wrong.

Ed - The 422,000 figure came from the school district papers which were handed out with the budget.

[momma3]

Hello all and thanks for the respose re: the assessed amount of our home. *** FYI page 52 of the slide show mentioned above states the average house was assesses at $422,00.00 meaning an 88 cent increase per day to that home owner. If this is not factually, why is the BOE able to publish this information so any member of our community will read this and except it as fact?

[justfacts]

gopybl & momma3

I think if you look closely again at the paper from the Assessor's Office once again, you'll see that the several hundred's of thousands numbers are for the MARKET VALUE - not the ASSESSED VALUE. The ASSESSED Values are numbers that are in the region of One Thousand dollars.

The papers from Mr. Stefanich (spelling) -a damned nice guy and well qualified for the job - are from the Town Receiver of Taxes. They list the term TAXABLE VALUE, not ASSESSED VALUE.

As to the information coming from the School District papers: I have too often found the School District information to be sloppy, incomplete and erroneous to treat their information as anything but suspect - often in need of independent verification.[/i]

The plaintalkonline site has some of the photocopies of that information handed out with the Budget papers. It became apparent to me that their calculations were flawed with regard to the estimated Property Tax in that they omitted from the tax levy the money for the library budget - which has been included by law each and every year!

That's just a $2 Million omission - that's all! I guess the District considerer's this to be among another of their "innocent arithmetic mistake" - to quote a former Administrator from his sworn testimony!

The more you learn about this District's use of Financial terms, and it's too common "arithmetic errors" the sooner you'll do as I have found necessary to do - check out all info supplied by the District as if it came from a Grade F student after a bad night of partying!

The information supplied on the Slide Show is but another example of wrong information coming from the "Professionals" in Administration for this District. I'll make a $1,000 bet that the Average house was NOT Assessed at $422,000.00 in Plainedge. The County Assessor is the authority on this. Any takers?

Anyone that tells you a house in Plainedge is assessed at four or five hundred thousand dollars is - - - mistaken (polite term) - - - or lying - - - and probably lying for a purpose!

Anyone that believes in those assessed values is also a short step away from being easily "duped" by the sharp tactics of "money operators".

Ed.

Get the Budget Bucks back to the Children - where they belong!

[justfacts]

For those that might still believe District figures:

The fact that I said there is no house assessed at $422,000 in Plainedge might be hard to swallow for so many that have heard these numbers often repeated and promulgated by the District.

To check me out, after all, I might be lying trying to make the District look bad, as I am often accused of, go get a copy of the 2005-6 tax bill. If you don't have one try a neighbor. The total numbers are the same on everyone's bill!

In the upper right hand corner you'll see set of three dollar figures, one under the other. The last one is labeled: "Assessed Valuation - School District".

That is what the Town bases it's collection of taxes on. The Value given is for all Class 1 property in the Plainedge District. If you look closely, you'll find that number is $12,654,323. That's for all the houses in Plainedge!

Since there are 6242 houses in Plainedge (figure is from the Assessor's Office) that comes to an "average" of $2,027.29 of Assessed value for each home in the District. In that year the assessed value was for 1/2% of the Market Value, this coming year the assessed value is for 1/4% of Market Value - bringing the new ASSESSED VALUE to half of what it was - and doubling the TAX RATE! (It works like a see-saw when one goes up, the other goes down)

If you also look at the second number down, that is the Tax Levy for all homes in the District. It is $37,131,328.41. Again, dividing that by the 6242 homes in the District yields $5948.63 - the "average house" tax payment for that year. That's the number that is also used by the District when it calculates the change from last year to this year.

So - HOMES IN PLAINEDGE WERE ASSESSED at an average of $2,027.29 - not anywhere near the number used by the District - $422,000. That number is flat out WRONG! This is not unusual for the District to do - put out wrong numbers![/i]

And that was what my Appeal last year was all about, After many failed attempts to work with the Administration to get them to use true figures in a Budget - I had to go to the Commissioner. Even that did not change their mistake/error prone figures in Budgets.

Information put out by the District is often flawed and often wrong!.

Ed.

[gopybl]

Ed - That's why your the financial wizard of P-Town...Thanks for the education.

[mythreekids]

Why didn't Ed run for a Board Seat? He seems like a smart man that knows his finances! We need financial experts on this board now. Someone with strong financial knowledge and has worked in the financial field either as a CPA, Accountant or in the Financial industry! Otherwise, there will NOT be change..
Ed- WHY DIDN'T YOU RUN!!!

[techie]

TO: MYTHREEKIDS,


Although I will not speak for another, I would like to tell you of an old story concerning what I think may be the actions of Mr. JUSTFACTS,....

If a man is hungry, and you are a fisherman, should you give him a fish?
Or, would it be beneficial to the man of hunger to teach him, his family, and to all he knows,... to learn HOW to fish?!?!?!

Just a thought,...


IMHO,........

[justfacts]

mythreekids

A valid question deserves a valid answer. And I don't know if you'll consider my answer valid - but it is my answer as to why I didn't run for the School Board.

I already am on a Board in the Plainedge District - the Library Board. I've been on it since I volunteered to fill in a vacated position in 1972. I've been elected and reelected to that Board ever since.

It is a joy and pleasure to serve since I have felt the need to "payback" Libraries for the pleasures and stirring of imagination they have given me since I first discovered them at age seven. I also served in the Library at High School. The other Trustees at the Plainedge library are such great and innovative persons that it provides me with good feelings to be associated with them.

At School District meetings for several years I had similar chances to try to work with the Board and Administration. I found no such similar skills in the professionals (Burns and Richman) and a lack of standing up for the community and control of the administrators by the Board. This judgment was based upon experience gained while serving on the library board, the NLS board and the Boards of several technical groups in the Industry that employed me.

In fact, a couple of Board members exhibited a high regard for their own self-interests and ego driven, non-intellectual actions - that were similar to those found in firmly entrenched "Buddy Boy" groups.

It would be a daunting task for one individual, working from within the Board, to change that. An impossible task, based upon my previous workings with similar groups run by an internal clique of self-centered friends, each gaining their own special benefits from controlling the Board for their own needs.

So I began to work from the outside - hoping that some few more in the community would begin to see the fundamental weakness and self-serving interests of a BOE that was disconnected from the community and "in-bed" with the Administration.

That outside position did not work well for a couple of years. It took much of my limited time from my wife and our frequent visits to various doctor's as she battled cancer, a fight she lost.

Then last year the catastrophe that shook the community woke many to the disaster that has been visited on Plainedge. Budget money for the children was being mis-managed and diverted into the Administration and Capital portions of the Budget and not being spent on the Children!

Nothing illustrates that better than the results from a Contingency Budget. Administration took their $1/2 Million in Raises and Bonuses and Capital got its $1.7 Million in Fund Balance - while the children had $1/2 Million taken from their programs.

Heroic efforts from many in the community put a temporary Band-Aid on the situation! But nothing was fixed!

The FIX is now apparent. The many heroes in this community have awakened and are running for the Board, running community action groups and, in general, in a position to fix the core of the problem.

The core of the fix is a BOE that works for the community and a new Administration that works for the children. Not just one different member.

I will aid those efforts from the outside - pointing out such things as the interest earnings from the TAN money earns offsetting money itself!

This reduces the bucks that have to go into the Capital part of the Budget and allows taxpayers to put the bucks into the Programs part of the Budget for the children! This year that is $1/3rd of a Million more to programs - if a revitalized Board forces the accounting change.

In a prior year, with the Appeal I filed with the commissioner, it made the Administration change its spending plans between the Administration and Program part of the budget if a contingency budget was adopted. That put $307,000 more into the Programs part of the budget.

These are the activities I am most comfortable with - and believe I can aid the efforts to get more bucks into the children's part of the budget with. Board membership itrself, with my particular personality (I tend too readily to tell people to "get lost and get out of here" if their too involved in themselves and not too bright), is not as productive.

And, as Techie said - I am free to teach more BOE members "how to fish" financially, rather than doing the fishing with them.

Ed.

Now on to the real task - get the most budget money to the Children!

[justfacts]

Here's some comment about our present District Budget and other things!

I just went through this e-mail exchange with a former School District activist. She always had calm and considered questions for the BOE and Administration at the various meetings.

I think that the message shows how the situation for even one of the most active participants can change. It is why I believe that Techie's comments about WEB-Casting Board Meetings are so very much to the point. The District, with today's technology that has already been acquired, could do a much better job of keeping a larger segment of the public up-to-date about meeting exchanges.

The present School District site, containing "Budget Information", is a sham in its content. There still is no Budget presented therein. That is, a budget as a budget is defined to be by the State Education Department.

It has just now been "enhanced" with a three part spreadsheet for a partial budget Expense portion, but still lacks the Revenue side of the Budget, the Salary Charts, the School District report card, etc.

The PDF Spreadsheet, creation date unknown, was made from an Excell spreadsheet by "clapier" on "5/1/06" at 21:28:48 hours and called "Latest Web.xls"

The lack of such information for this district, so long after the last Board Meeting, says volumes about the Administration's concern for the voters and their desire to keep them informed.

Ed


Here's the e-mail exchange:

***************************************

Miss L,

They have not put out that information as yet. Although there is much info about how little money the budget increase comes to, how it is pennies per day, etc., but there is no BUDGET put forth by the District for the public to see!

Ed.

Miss L wrote:
> Ed-Hi. If this address still works and this gets to you, I have a
> question. Do you have a copy of the packet of information that is
> supposed to be left at every school regarding the budget? I just
> checked the web site and there is very little information as
> compared to the format from the past two years.
> There is no listing of administrative salaries, etc.
>
> I have not been able to get to any meetings because I have
> literally been doing three people's jobs at work. I hope to
> get to the meet the candidate night.

Miss L.


*************************************************


Let's get most of the Budget money into the Programs for the Children!

[justfacts]

A quick review of the latest spreadsheets

The District has made changes in the third budget spreadsheet from the one of Draft III on 3/31/2006

Now, on 5/4/2006 they have done the following on a new spreadsheet:

In three areas of Account 9080; Unemployment Insurance - they have dropped the estimated expenses - $4,224 in the Administration part; $8,448 in the Capital part; and $29,658 in the Programs part. That is a total reduction of $42,240 in estimated Unemployment Insurance expenses.

In the Programs part in Account 2100; K-12 Education program - they have added $70,256 to bring the new total to $1,133,915.

In the Programs part in Account 2855; Interscholastic Athletics - they have added $100,693 to bring the new total to $373,741.

This is a total of $170,949 in additions and $42,240 in reductions - yielding a net Budget total increase of $128,709.

This brings the total Budget Expense Increase to $6,063,346 from its prior $5,934,637.[/i]

Bottom line of where the budget bucks are going:
Part of Budget __________ Percentage
Administration ____________ 10.1
Capital __________________ 19.8
Programs ________________ 70.2 (70 cents on the dollar!)

These are the total Budget changes in the two spreadsheets distributed a month apart. I hope this saves you some time in figuring out the new spreadsheet!

Ed

On to the coming new year of Board of Education control over the Administration! May the new acronym be:

Control ~ Perfomance ~ Responsiveness!

[momma3]

Just Facts, thanks for the info but what does that mean in terms of that 10.5% number of the budget increase. Is that figure we all read in the paper now higher or lower? Thanks

[justfacts]

More copies of e-mails

Sometimes it takes a comment from the outside to wake us all up. Again, the District has not followed through on meeting even the simplest of Budget tasks! They are behind on supplying a complete budget - they are behind on providing the notices. In fact, it seems they are multiple behinds!

This e-mail request woke me up - Does it do the same to you?

A copy of the e-mail exchanges:

************************************************

Miss L wrote:
> Ed-Isn't there a law that it has to be presented 30 days before the
> vote?
>
> Miss L.

***********************************

Miss L

Although the District first noticed a revised meetings schedule, including budget hearing dates, in their February 14th minutes - they have not published such a schedule to the public on their site, mailed such revised schedules to homes, or recorded any minutes for meetings after February 16th for any of us to see that information. The independent plaintalkonline.com site records that the Budget vote is on May 16th and the Budget hearing meeting is on May 9th.

Being that it is now May 4th, they are delinquent in providing the required notice - and questionable about having a Complete Budget Available. The site was just updated this morning, May 4th, with a spreadsheet which gives only a portion of the required information (see prior post). It lacks completness in many, many areas! It in no way meets the requirement of being a Budget.

**************************************

Here are the required availability dates from the State Budget Handbook:

AVAILABILITY OF PROPOSED BUDGETS

Each board of education is required to have the proposed budget for Common, Union Free, Central and Small City schools available for public comment.

The budget must be complete and available upon request to residents within the district seven days before the budget hearing.

The board of education, as part of the notice of the annual meeting referred to in part B. of this section, must give notice that district residents may obtain a copy of the budget, and provide time and place where budgets will be available.

The budget shall be completed at least fourteen days before the annual or special meeting and copies thereof shall be prepared and made available, upon request, to residents within the district during the period fourteen days immediately preceding such meeting and at such meeting.

The board shall also, as a part of the notice required, give notice that a copy of such statement may be obtained by any resident at each schoolhouse in the district in which school is maintained during certain designated hours on each day other than a Saturday, Sunday or holiday during the fourteen days immediately preceding such meeting." (Education Law, §§ 1608, 1716, 2003, 2004).

Common, union free, central high school district and small city school districts shall mail a school budget notice to all qualified voters of the school district after the date of the budget hearing but no later than six days prior to budget vote(s) and election. The school budget notice shall compare the percentage increase or decrease in the proposed budget over total spending under the school district budget adopted for the current year, with the percentage increase decrease in the consumer price index.

Commencing with the proposed budget for the two thousand one--two thousand two school year, such notice shall also include a description of how total spending and the tax levy resulting from the proposed budget would compare with a projected contingency budget assuming that the contingency budget is adopted on the same day as the vote on the proposed budget.

Such comparison shall be in total and by component (program, capital and administrative), and shall include a statement of the assumptions made in estimating the projected contingency budget. The notice shall also include a comparison of the tax savings under the basic school tax relief (STAR) exemption authorized by section four hundred twenty-five of the real property tax law and the increase or decrease in school taxes from the prior year, and the resulting net taxpayer savings, for a hypothetical home within the district with a full value of one hundred thousand dollars, under the existing school district budget with such savings under the proposed budget. The notice shall also set forth the date, time and place of the school budget vote (see Appendix J, Page 71 for form). (Education Law §2022)


*************************************************


Wouldn't have been nice if they had just met these requirements?

Ed.

;D Time to get in a BOE team that can ensure the Administration gets its job done right - and on time!!! ;D

Control ~ Performance ~ Responsiveness!

[justfacts]

momma3

The Third budget increase was listed at !0.32% and 10.3% in two different places on the same Budget release information sheet.

The present spreadsheets now list the budget increase as 10.5%

If you use a calculator (or longhand division) you will calculate the latest stated budget increase to be 10.55%.

I have no idea of what number you will read in the paper - nor what number will be presented at the upcoming Budget Hearing. Let's all go and find out together!


Ed.

70 cents on the budget dollar now going to the children! What will it be next year?