NY Budget: Going, Going, Not Quite Gone...
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March 28, 2007
Efforts to meet New York's budget deadline went late into the night all parties are pushing to finish the budget on time for a third year in a row, bucking the previous 20-year tardy streak. Michael Davoli, spokesperson for the Alliance for Quality Education, said the hold-up is over school funding and has Democrats and Republicans sparring over who gets a bigger share of the pie.
"The governor's budget will ensure that the kids that need money the most get the resources they need by fully funding our schools for the first time."
But Republicans want to make sure that wealthy high-taxed school districts continue to receive their traditional share of school aid funding.
Those in favor of school funding reform say the Republican majority plan would continue the status quo and take money away from poorer schools to give to wealthier ones. Trudi Renwick from the non-partisan Fiscal Policy Institute ran the numbers of the Republican proposal. She reports that it works out in favor of richer school districts.
"That gives them much more state aid. In fact, there's over fifty districts that get more than a 25 percent increase in state aid."
She adds poor districts would lose a third of the funding Spitzer is proposing. To meet the budget deadline, an agreement would have to be reached today because it takes two days just to print the entire budget.
Davoli belives that passing the budget on time isn't as important as making sure that universal pre-k, smaller class sizes, and other benefits of increased funding reach all schools.
"All of these things cost money, and that's what our schools are lacking, and that's exactly what this budget would do."