The School Committee Budget Resolution supporting the proposed override and two debt exclusions passed 8-0 during the February 6 School Committee meeting. Last week, Fig City News focused on a notable abstention from the vote. However, the remaining eight members, including the Mayor, unanimously approved the Resolution drafted by Chair Tamika Olszewski (Ward 4) and Vice Chair Kathy Shields (Ward 7). All the of the individuals cited below are School Committee members.
Ms Olszewski introduced the Resolution by stating the statutory obligation of the School Committee to secure funding for the schools, and she assured voters and residents that the School Committee would be “good stewards” of the override funds. She added that the override would allow the School Committee “to preserve the quality of education.”
The discussion among the School Committee members focused on the wording of the Resolution, rather than members debating to attempt to convince other members to vote Yes or No. Chris Brezski (Ward 2) raised three drafting concerns: one technicality about the Countryside debt exclusion process, a flag that “equity” was not listed as an explicit district goal alongside academic excellence, and a comment that the override itself does not make the district’s budget sustainable from the perspective of eliminating the structural deficit.
During the meeting, Ms. Shields proposed modest edits to address Mr. Brezski’s points, which were included in the final document approved by the Committee. Emily Prenner (Ward 5) explained her vote by citing that prior School Committees all voted to support overrides during the previous four override campaigns, She also stated her view that the School Committee is elected to support students, and therefore to not endorse the override would be a “dereliction of duty.”
Rajeev Parliker (Ward 1) stated “the reality for all of us is that we need the additional funding for our schools,” though he added, “we still face the challenging task of getting to a sustainable budget.” Mr. Parlikar also referred to constituents who have expressed reservations about approving the overrides due to their concerns about academic excellence, and he analogized not approving the override for that reason as “cutting off your nose to spite your face.”
Anping Shen (Ward 3) also linked funding with providing academic excellence, stating that it was not inconsistent to be critical about certain City decisions but also vote in favor of the override.
Mayor Fuller stated that she is “always committed to making sure growth in [the City’s] school allocation matches budget growth,” and she noted that Massachusetts law requires the City to balance its budget. In response to questions about why the Horace Mann project is included in this year’s operating override ballot question, the Mayor reminded the Committee that the 2013 operating override also included capital projects such as the new Zervas building and a new firehouse. Ms. Olszewski called for the vote following Mayor Fuller’s comments.
The discussion of the Budget Resolution begins at approximately 2:54:00 of the replay on NewTV.
