BERNARD J. HEANEY
(Revision 3, April 30,
2015)
Revision 2 changes
are bolded in red.
Subject: TEMPLETON’S
CONTRIBUTIONS TO ITS SCHOOLS
On April 2nd The Gardner News
published an article titled “Assessment Challenge Withdrawn” which contained a
number of statements by Superintendent Miller regarding Templeton’s Local
Contributions to school expenses.
She was quoted as saying that Templeton was
“under effort” for education funding last year by nearly $ 800,000, when in
fact we were nearly $ 800,000 over the “effort” level. She was also quoted as saying, “The reason
that Templeton’s increase is higher … is that they’ve been under effort for a few years,” when, in
fact, the last five years the town of Templeton has funded education not only
above the Minimum Required Local Contribution level but, above the Target (effort)
level by an average of 10 percent.
Each year the Department of Elementary and
Secondary Education (DESE) calculates a number of values for towns to follow
while supporting their school systems.
These calculations can be very complicated and confusing to the general
public. When discussing these numbers it
is important that you understand which value you are talking about. Each year DESE calculates a town’s - Maximum
Local Contribution (MLC), Target LC, Preliminary LC, and Required LC. Two of these values are important; these are
the Target LC and Required LC. To simplify
this issue you need to know that the
Target LC is sometimes referred to as the Effort
Level and the Required LC is often called the Minimum Required
Contribution. A more complete and technical definition of
these terms may be found under:
The Minimum
Required LC is that number that a town should never fund below. It is the absolute minimum local contribution
that can be budgeted by a town for its school system. In this case, the Required LC includes two
numbers, Templeton’s share of Narragansett Regional School District (NRSD) costs
and our share of Montachusett Regional Vocational Technical School (MRVTS) costs.
The much higher,
Target LC is that number that
DESE encourages towns to contribute.
The first
comment made in the April 2nd article was that Templeton’s required
contributions increased recently because “… the town has been chronically
‘under effort” according to the Department of Elementary and Secondary
Education…” This statement is not true. The TGN article went on to quote Ms. Miller as
saying, “the town was under effort by about $800,000 in the last fiscal year.” The last fiscal year was FY14.
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April 5, 2015
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Templeton’s Education Contributions, Rev 2
(continued)
Revision 2 changes
are bolded in red.
I believe
Ms. Miller may have been misquoted, because this is not true. Actually, the 800,000 difference had nothing
to do with the town actually being “under effort” or below Target. It was simply the difference between DESE’s
Target figure and Required
Contribution figure on a calculation
sheet for FY14 that was “about $800,000”.
( FY14’s
Target [effort] 4,963,418 minus FY14’s Required 4,170,850 = 792,568 )
Again, the above “$800,000” difference had nothing to do
with Templeton’s actual contribution for FY14.
In fact, the town was not only well above the Minimum Required LC
but, was significantly higher than the Target LC. Templeton’s
actual contribution (as related to the
DESE requirements) was $5,582,130.
(ATM Art 27, voted $4,430,615 plus an override Oct STM Art 1 of $550,459 plus ATM Art 20 for Monty Tech of $601,056 = $5,582,130).
With a Target LC of
4,963,418 and actual payments of 5,582,130 Templeton was actually over the Target
(effort) Local Contribution amount by 618,712. (12.5%)
Also, for this year (FY15) we will be $
720,880 over Target Local Contribution.
(14.4%)
All of the data supporting these conclusions
are a matter of public record and may be found on the Department of Elementary
and Secondary Education’s website and on the Town of Templeton’s website.
I have spoken with DESE’s and Narragansett school
officials and been assured that my “numbers are all good.” However, because the preceding figures can
be confusing to some, I have been asked
to emphasis, in this letter, the following: Although Templeton has contributed a five year average of 10.0 percent over Target and 34 percent over Minimum Required LC, a good part
of this support is due to three overrides during FY 12, 13 & 14. If you take override support out of the
picture, then these percentages drop
to an average of 3.8 percent over Target and 26.7 percent over Minimum
Required Contributions.
It is understood that this letter was submitted to The Gardner News in early April and
so far, the letter has not been published.
I was told by Mr. Heaney that he" had to explain these figures to Ms.Miller five times, before she under stood and admitted he was right." I asked Mr. Heaney if I could put his letter on the blog, and he said yes. So it appears to me that we are not the tight fistted cheap, people Ms. Miller thought we are .Bev.
ReplyDeleteSo when does Ms. Miller print or state the facts she presented to the town were wrong again and agian? How does the taxpayer ever take a override for the school system to the ballot again?
ReplyDeleteDo we as voters feel scamed? If this letter is true and we had to give a half million to the school we didn't need to how do we get the money back? The school supporters don't want this info in the papers and i'm sure it will be kept out. The Gardner news has a way to keep the info in they want in and the info out they don't. Think about it when it came down to the light and water issues when the print LTE and don't make all the world of difference. I know this myself for a fact the timming was key for the sway of votes. With the point to be made by Bernie in the letter the time to verify and check would keep TGN from allowing it's release. I feel Bernie represents the facts more so then the FORMER superintendant did all along for us and the school system.No wonder our town has had a noose around our neck when the department who took the most always took to much. It's time to focus back on the LIGHT department and the way the rates get figured and ask why with the costs going down why not the bills we recieve. Why hasn't the customer charge gone down another dollar to make it 2.00 a month. With the yearly reduction of 100k from the nuke plant costs less every year it was from our overcharges in the past that should be paid back to us and ASAP. The lack of a PILOT payment as in every year up till 2014 should be given back to the public not the workers in a extra benifit package. Why did the light change the Auditors and change the forms they report on. Who thinks not putting the full report on the town report is failure to do the duties of General manager? I DO !