When is the other shoe going to drop? When will New York understand that merely cutting funding, without reducing mandated costs, means that schools will eventually crash?
In 2010, the property tax cap was passed with great fanfare. Gov. Andrew Cuomo hailed it as a victory for taxpayers. For those of us who were tired of continual increases in property taxes, it came as a huge relief.
With the passage of the tax cap, Cuomo also stated that the other piece to the puzzle was mandate relief, and again, with great fanfare, created groups that would gather information across the state to provide him with the information he needed to alleviate the burden of unfunded mandates that had fueled the dramatic rise in property taxes over the past 10 years.
So, what happened? In a word, nothing. No mandate relief, no reduction in costs, other than items whose impact will not be felt for many years. A new pension tier is welcome, but it only became necessary because politicians sold out the system in 1999 by reducing what employees paid into the system. Medicare costs will be picked up for towns and cities, but not immediately.
What about schools? Not only has there been no mandate relief, but mandated costs are rising faster than the much-touted property tax cap itself. The new teacher evaluation system has added millions in additional costs to school districts for training, labor and other expenses, and there is no aid to reduce those costs. In my school district, a conservative estimate is $200,000 of expenses in the first year of implementation for teacher evaluations. If you cannot reduce mandates, at least do not add to them.
What about the "money pits" in budgets — pension, the Triborough Amendment to the Taylor Law, and health care costs? Cuomo himself has stated the "political will" is not there to address these issues. Of course not — they are what led to increases in costs in schools.
Addressing anything else is merely nibbling around the edges of mandate reform. Those three issues have made expenses rise, removed contract negotiation bargaining power, and made cost containment all but impossible.
As an example, if our pension costs were at the same rate as they were in 2000, we would save $2.25 million this year alone. Also, since we are required by Triborough to pay salary "step" increases with or without a contract, districts' bargaining power is weakened. And all of us are experiencing the rise in health care costs — even after moving to consortium purchases, self-insured plans and reducing the overall benefits.
Does Cuomo want to drive districts into mergers to end the problems of funding? When will the governor realize that starving schools into mergers will merely be a short detour on that road. Until true mandate relief in New York becomes a reality, the question will remain: When is the other shoe going to drop?
Hoffman is superintendent of the Averill Park Central School District.