[Local-Maine-Schools] April 27: Report from Augusta

[Brian Hubbell]

Yesterday afternoon, at the invitation of Representative Emily Cain and
Representative Hannah Pingree, Rob, Gail, Paul, and I traveled from MDI to
Augusta and met with Hannah, Emily, and Senator Damon in Hannah's office.
Representative Koffman, who had to work back at COA, joined us by speaker
phone for the full length of the meeting.

It was a very good meeting.  Each of the legislators were extremely generous
to us with their time, staying with us much longer than originally promised
despite many other concurrent obligations that very obviously were competing
for their attention.

There seems no doubt that they take our concerns seriously.  For that, and
for their willingness to listen and to advocate on our behalf, we are very
grateful.

The points of discussion are summarized below.  In some parts, the positions
were not necessarily explicitly made by all four legislators.  However, this
does, I think, reflect a certain consensus.

The section of the budget effecting school consolidation remains very much
under political negotiation.  Our legislators caution that political
negotiations should not be the final basis for good educational policy.  To
this we can only strongly agree.  But this is where we stand at present.

The Legislative leadership expects the budget reported out by May 11.  It
will contain either some version of school consolidation that books $36
million in savings in GPA or else GPA will be reduced overall.  Overall
reduction in GPA is understood to carry serious political consequences and
serious consequences to schools statewide.

Our own legislators do not support legislation that makes consolidation
mandatory in opposition to local wishes or to the detriment of existing
functioning structures.  Our own Union 98 is generally recognized to be a
high-performing system that already functions centrally with fair
efficiency.  Given that we already have a common teachers' contract,
centralized curriculum coordination, special education direction,
administrative and budget staff, Union 98 in many ways can serve as a model
for other locations.

Our legislators hold that our school administrative units should be allowed
to set their own governing organizations, their own cost sharing formulas,
their own educational policies, their own budgets.

Originally intended as a "safety-net" minimum benchmark, EPS has become
dangerously misunderstood now as an "adequate" standard.  This needs to be
clarified in any policy reference to EPS.

Everyone favors budget "transparency" -- including the use of EPS cost
categories for inter-district comparisons .  We oppose any application of
EPS as a basis for limiting spending or as a threshold requiring referendum
to override.

Any school budget process that requires a super-majority for approval is
undemocratic and fundamentally unacceptable.

All generally acknowledge that local relationships between local schools and
the state Department of Education are broken.  Fundamental work needs to be
done to rebuild these into functional, collaborative partnerships.
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