Attention must be paid to school funding

The leadership of Marl-boro CARES (Committee for Active Responsible Education Solutions), a not-for-profit educational organization, wishes to express thanks to the News Transcript and to staff writer Tali Israeli for the article published several weeks ago about the organization.

Marlboro CARES wishes to clarify, however, its position relative to Marlboro's Board of Education.

The Marlboro board, like many others in the state, is faced with tremendous stress to cope with increasing costs of administration caused by a myriad of issues which include but are not limited to ever-increasing student enrollment, increasing requirements by the state to fund pensions, increasing class sizes, increasing fuel costs, increasing costs of teacher salaries and benefits and a host of additional requirements relating to special education needs.

We are in fact working with the board to remedy problems where we can and to bring greater community awareness to the issues mentioned above. We are launching a community-based initiative to bring more computers into our school system and we are working on bringing the community together around an autism walk later in the year as two examples where we think we can make a difference.

Marlboro CARES is appreciative of the efforts of all who give in support of our school system and thereby our community.

The Marlboro Board of Education is comprised of hard-working, well-intentioned, giving and thoughtful people. It would be wrong to imply that the efforts of Superintendent of Schools Dr. David Abbott, board President Warren Brumel and the other hard-working board members are anything but well-intentioned.

The same can be said for many of the people in the administration that work to keep our communities strong. After years of dedicated service to public education, it would be wrong to fail to acknowledge their service and good intentions.

The real point is that the situation in funding public education is grave. It is bad and it is getting worse with each year as evidenced by the proposed nearly 9 percent budget increase in K-8 from $69 million to $75 million with school busing as a second question to the community which would bring the increase over 10 percent.

This along with real property tax reassessments due this year make the proposed impact on homeowners potentially disastrous.

Does anyone care enough to cause a change in the way costs of education are managed?

In the mid- to late-1970s when then-Gov. Brendan Byrne was faced with the need to deal with education costs, he implemented New Jersey's first state income tax. He made education a matter for everyone in the state.

In the wake of Abbott v. Burke, the years from 2000 on have become a property tax nightmare cloaked around the veil of increased property values. But as we all know, housing prices don't go up forever.

It is too easy to pass the costs of education on to property owners as if there was some endless source of funding from within the over 600 local school districts across the state. The state should not repudiate its duty to financially support education - especially since the state regulates education in so many ways. As a kicker the state removes funding sources as well.

Does anyone else think it is a travesty that state lottery revenues are no longer used for education but for other matters like support of correctional institutions?

We are trying to come together to address the challenges facing our community with real support and cooperation from our civic and political leaders: the mayor, our Town-ship Council, our board, our state representatives, our administrators and our community members alike.

For those who care, come join Marlboro CARES. Our next meeting is scheduled for April 20. More details can be found at the Internet Web site www.marlborocares.org.

Mitch Konichowsky

Marlboro