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...and a thermos full of Allen's :lol:
Because, as we all know, ALL THEY'LL SMELL IS COFFEE!!
:mrgreen:
Unfortunately, the article is not accessible online at this time, but check the York County Coast Star for more about the ongoing debate of the school funding formula. Below is a quote from the article that made my blood boil!
"Kennebunk Town Manager Barry Tibbetts suggested on February 23 that all state aid coming to the district be directed to Kennebunk rather than go to the district where it would be split between Kennebunk and Kennebunkport. I think a short-term solution during the transition is to send all state aid money to Kennebunk....The application of all State Aid to Kennebunk is not a long-term solution but it gives us some more time to examine the issue and possible solutions."
HELLLOOO! What part of this wasn't predictable. Kennebunk entered into the Ramp Up agreement, they knew the plan! Had Barry Tibbetts not spent the 1.3 million dollar surplus, and put all his eggs in one basket being carried by Chris Babbidge, perhaps he wouldn't be trying to take the Port's long overdue state aid!
Yep. You have it down, Kristi. I haven't seen the article yet, but I can imagine it... more bleating about how they HAD to spend all that $2M in surplus and new bonding initiatives. Well. Time to pay the piper, Mr. Tibbetts. If our selectmen haven't ratified his new contract yet, they may want to rethink things after tonight's shindig.
Kristi, I will see you there tonight if you're attending. For those who can't make it in person, the meeting will be televised on Adelphia channels 2 and 16, 7:00 pm.
Seeking school funding solution
By Jim Kanak
jkanak@seacoastonline.com
KENNEBUNKPORT — The MSAD71 School Board will hold a workshop at 7 p.m. tonight (March 2) with selectmen from Kennebunk and Kennebunkport at the Village Fire Station in the Port. The purpose is to discuss “mutually agreeable solutions†to the current issues surrounding the school funding formula in the district. Currently, some have suggested that action be taken to soften the financial impact of the changing formula on Kennebunk taxpayers.
http://www.seacoastonline.com/news/yorkstar/03022006/news/90467.htm
A Tale of Crocodiles and Crocodile Tears
Fighting to stay in Maine
York County Coast Star
3/2/06
To write a letter to the editor please email opinion@seacoastonline.com
Many of us choose to live (and remain) in Maine because of the unrivaled lifestyle. We historically have understood that incomes here are dwarfed by the salaries paid in other states. And we accepted this risk because the lifestyle reward was so great. We’ve always justified fighting to stay because, well, we love it here and this is where we want to be.
Read the Full Crocodile Tears Tale Here
My response to this Tale of Woe:
To the editor:
The Star editorial from 3/2/06 on the current fiscal hardships in Maine is a rich exercise in tearful hand-wringing, coming from a publication that never met a single state, school or town spending initiative it didn't support and trumpet.
I have Star articles and editorials spanning a decade, saying no amount of Kennebunk tax dollars were too many, whether it was two overly-large new schools, the town community center, the new trolley system, the new WK fire station, the never-ending school budget increases, etc., etc.
In the meantime, your publication has never missed an opportunity to downgrade and dismiss the concerns raised over the years by both the Cause group and the Kennebunk Taxpayers' Association, who have repeatedly said this day would be coming.
Now that the fiscal chickens have come home to roost, I find your self-serving editorial to be far too little, far too late. Crocodile tears, indeed.
Sincerely yours,
Naran Row-Spaulding
Well, tonight's meeting certainly was a humdinger. Kristi, very nice to finally meet you, and chat for a minute!
The Kennebunkport board of selectmen should be congratulated - they stuck to their guns, and handed it to our board square in the chops. The Port already bailed us out last year to the tune of $1.1M dollars on the school funding, and no way are they going to subsidize the spending addiction on this side of the bridge again this year.
Our board wanted the Port to give us $300K from their state aid this year, to "soften the blow" from Kennebunk's education shortfall.
When the Port asked our board "Why didn't you save the $1.6M surplus you had last year? Why did you spend it, when you knew this might happen with the school funding??"
SILENCIO.
CRICKETS.
They had nothing to say. I wonder if they remember all the times our group tried to tell them the same thing, last year. But they wouldn't listen.
As an added attraction, both our Democratic legislators, Nancy Sullivan and Chris Babbidge, were soundly put in their places tonight by the Port board, who frankly told Babbidge they thought he'd done an end-run around them in Augusta, trying to modify last year's agreement without notifying them first.
Not to mention, both Sullivan and Babbidge voted for LD1 in the first place.
It was an interesting evening.
Note: Add following to things to do list
1) buy case of tums while grocery shopping this weekend
2) Wrap case of tums with nice card signed by Dirigo, LD1 and Gimic
3) mail case of tums to Democratic Party state HQ
:mrgreen:
It was a pleasure to meet you too Naran, as well as your fellow residents from Kennebunk, who ironically supported the Kennebunkport Board of Selectmen's opinion about Kennebunk's "shortfall". My Selectmen made me proud to be a resident of K'port once again! They played their cards just right, IMHO.
Some of the interesting points from the evening included:
*Karen Schlegel (School Board and Kennebunkport resident) sold out the Port early on by saying something like "giving Kennebunk $300,000 doesn't seem like THAT much money."
*Mat Lanigan (Port Selectmen) saying to Kennebunk Town Manager and Selectmen something like "Why did you spend your 1.6 million dollar surplus, and why should WE bail you out?"
Bob Sullivan (Port Selectmen) saying " Don't you think you should take the $300,000 out of your reserve accounts" and the subsequent silence that followed...
John Sharood essentially threatening the Port with impending doom and gloom predictions of declining quality of education if we don't cough up the cash! This after his earlier more composed speeches about how he wanted it all to work out. Huh? Is that how you do that, you threaten people...I guess I've been doing it wrong.
FINALLY,
What really gets me is that the School District choose to build the gargantuan Kennebunk elementary school that has empty classrooms (that we heat, clean and will be required to maintain). In the Port we have an old small school (which works for me honestly) but our kids are going to school in cold classrooms and have the lights out in certain areas to conserve energy! Good job, we all know that kids learn best when they're freezing and can't see!
Kristi, I have long maintained that in fairness, the new elementary school should have been built in Kennebunkport. And of course, making it half the size wouldn't have hurt, either. But nooooo - it had to be over here, and it had to be twice as large as really needed. Again - we tried, but nobody would listen.
The other highlight of last night's meeting was when your board rightly reminded our board that not one single Kennebunk selectman had made all those trips to Augusta, when all this funding legislation was being hammered out last year, or this year. Not a single one of them.
Again - SILENCIO. Nothing but gum-chewing from our side of the head table.
You hit it exactly right on the emotional blackmail from John Sharood. He is a Kennebunk resident, and was clearly being partisan in his pitch to get the money from the Port, despite declaring his neutrality as a school board member.
In truth, his arguments that the budget might fail otherwise are specious; the effect of $300K more to decrease Kennebunk's school mil rate would be nothing but pennies.
If he is sincerely worried about the new budget not passing, then he should convince our selectmen to cough up the $1.3M from their own surplus, and have done with it. We currently have $4.5M sitting in the bank, and while we know they love having it there for their own pet projects, it's time to pay the piper.
As your board so firmly and rightly stated last night, our board had $1.6M in extra surplus, and they should have saved it against this eventuality. They didn't.
It's not the Port's job to bail us out this time, and I hope they don't bend to the emotional blackmail of "It's For the Children," which will certainly continue.
Here's the other important tidbit in all this -
Kennebunk's decreased share of the state aid was largely due to the state upping our property valuation figures by 20% in one year.
Kennebunk had the opportunity to contest that valuation. We asked them to contest it. They chose not to do so. If they had, they might have been able to get that figure decreased, thus increasing their share of the state aid.
And so, once again, this is a problem of their own making.
What LD1 does for our town.....it allows voters to weigh in when our selectmen decide to go over the limit. I haven't seen much else positive come from it. It fails to address the enormous amount of spending our school system is doing. When the budget is around 80% school spending it isn't logical to go after the smaller 20%. I am thankful it hinders some municipal spending but not too much.
Ahhhh, I cannot wait for TABOR :) Our town could never get a majority to override, it will put a stop to wasteful spending immediately.
Evan - the problem is, even though we get a chance to vote when our selectmen go over the limit, it's hard to get anything voted down with a stacked meeting. And the special interest groups certainly are good at stacking those meetings.
We need a referendum vote on all town spending matters, at least in Kennebunk.
That's how we got control of our own school budgets - we did a successful petition drive to move the school budget vote off the district meeting floor to a referendum. That was the turning point, after years of double-digit increases.
You are absolutely correct, we could use that as well in Waterboro. Our selectmen just slip everything through at town meeting and the special interest always attend.
It is a slap in the face to residents, selectmen know the system and abuse it.
I was so happy to see Kennebunk take a stand, hopefully Waterboro will this time around also.
It takes some work to get such a petition completed and enacted, but if it can be done in Kennebunk, with a firmly entrenched Entitlement Brigade, it can be done anywhere.
The prime objection you'll hear from town hall is that "gee, referendums cost more money." Don't let this deter you. The prime rebuttal is that a referendum election enables far more residents to have a vote, and that's their Constitutional right.
Those who work second shift can't get to town meeting. Neither can many disabled or folks unable to leave their homes due to illness, or those out of the country or state on military assignments.
A referendum is a far more democratic way of doing the town's business.
Reprinted here with the permission of the author:
LTTE Kennebunkpost
http://www.kennebunkpost.com/
3/3/06
Thanks, K’port
Editor:
LD 1, when passed in the last Legislature, changed the cost sharing formula between the two towns that make up MSAD 71. These changes were reviewed by our town managers, selectmen, school board and administration in the early part of last year.
These community leaders all had the opportunity to understand the impact on local school funding. This law resulted in Kennebunk absorbing in excess of $3,000,000 annually, a school expense that was previously paid by Kennebunkport.
Kennebunkport, not the state, stepped up to the plate and agreed to a four-year phase-in of their reduction. Nothing has changed this year in the state formula, but these same leaders would have you believe that this is a new unforeseen crisis, even pitting one town against the other, with threats by one to withdraw from the district.
The state is responsible for the problem in somehow recognizing that all facets of government, except schools, should be supported by all citizens based on their ability to pay.
In spite of the above, and warning from the public of its impact on the town of Kennebunk, our town management is operating in a vacuum, proposing for a third year in a row double digit increases in government spending, used a timing issue on the payment of property taxes to spend an additional $1,000,000 after the original budget passed in June of last year.
Based on current projections, you could take your tax bill for the current year, add 14 percent to the town portion and eight percent to the school portion to get an approximate impact on your taxes for the next year.
Contact our local state legislators who supported LD 1, a law that is both fiscally irresponsible and a charade in its attempt to meet the public’s demand that the state fund 55 percent of education costs, ask them for the relief promised. A special thanks to the town of Kennebunkport would be appropriate.
Very truly yours,
Edward Geoghan
Kennebunk
Well, for those who can attend, the fun and hijinks of Kennebunk' baksheesh badgering of the Port continues today, 4:00, at the SAD 71 Finance Committee meeting; central office meeting room. This particular meeting will not be televised.
In Which: various Kennebunk town administration members, haggard from a weekend dodging emails, will do their best to perpetuate the specious numbers they're insisting on using.
In Which: our town manager will try to say (again) that the state bases EPS on local property valuations; despite being incorrect, mistaken, erroneous, and offbase.
In Which: the blackmail of "It's For the Children" will continue from Kennebunk, trying to paint the Port as heartless, greedy coin-hoarders, who hate little kiddies.
Come early if you want a good seat, and don't spare the tomatoes.
Posted on the Kennebunkport Town Website today:
STATEMENT OF KENNEBUNKPORT BOARD OF SELECTMEN
Last year, we went to Augusta with the leaders of Kennebunk and School
Administrative District 71 and worked out a compromise to address the
impact of the State's new Essential Programs and Services (EPS) school funding
formula. The State's new EPS cost sharing formula requires that
Kennebunk take on a greater share of the costs of education in SAD 71 because
Kennebunk has significantly more students than Kennebunkport. In order
to soften the impact of the State's new cost sharing formula on the
taxpayers of Kennebunk, the two towns and the School District agreed to phase in
the State's new formula over a four-year period. This compromise was agreed
to by representatives of both towns and SAD 71, and was enacted into law by
the Maine legislature as "private and special" legislation.
Some citizens of Kennebunkport criticized us last year for agreeing to a
compromise that results in more education costs to Kennebunkport than
Maine's school funding law requires. We reluctantly supported the
compromise because we believed that it was in the best interest of the
children of both towns and the future of SAD 71 to gradually phase in
the new cost sharing formula, with the understanding that the new formula
would be fully implemented by the end of the four-year period.
After working with the leaders of Kennebunk and SAD 71 to arrive at a
compromise, we are now faced with proposals by Kennebunk town leaders to
reject that compromise. Under these proposals, both the compromise and
the cost sharing formula that applies throughout the State of Maine would be
permanently scrapped in SAD 71. In its place would be a new formula that
would require Kennebunkport to pay significantly more towards education
than the compromise that was adopted last year.
According to the Department of Education, the new proposals that have
been advanced on behalf of Kennebunk in the Legislature would cost the
citizens of Kennebunkport between $410,000 and $620,000 more in the next fiscal
year, with an equivalent savings to Kennebunk. These increased costs would be
over and above the compromise that was reached in 2005. Because the
proposals that Kennebunk has advanced would be permanent, these
proposals would shift millions of dollars in additional costs from Kennebunk to
Kennebunkport in the coming years. Kennebunk recently presented a new
proposal that would cost the citizens of Kennebunkport $300,000 more for
the benefit of Kennenunk in the next fiscal year, which is over and above
the agreement that was reached last year.
Kennebunk's proposals are a fundamental change of the compromise that
was reached last year between the leaders of Kennebunk, Kennebunkport and
SAD 71. It is especially ironic that the leaders of both towns and the
District received praise and recognition for working together to reach the 2005
agreement. The Biddeford Journal Tribune editorialized in January,
2005, that the "residents of Kennebunk and Kennebunkport have much to be
grateful for in the quality of local officials who serve their public" as a
result of both towns' cooperative efforts in reaching the agreement. Last June,
SAD 71 bestowed a Special Achievement Award on leaders of both towns for our
joint efforts.
It is unfair to ask Kennebunkport to accept further changes to the
State's cost sharing formula beyond what all parties agreed to last year. Over
the past 30 years, Kennebunkport has paid a disproportionate share of the
costs of education in SAD 71, under a local cost-sharing formula that was
based principally on property valuation and gave little weight to pupil count.
The State's new EPS cost sharing formula, which is primarily based on
pupil count, will only partially correct this inequity. The old cost-sharing
formula that is unfair to Kennebunkport will continue to apply in
apportioning certain costs that are not recognized by the State's EPS
model. It is hardly unreasonable for Kennebunkport to oppose any changes to the
compromise that was reached last year between both towns and SAD 71 and
adopted by the Maine Legislature.
According to the Department of Education, the new proposals that have
been advanced on behalf of Kennebunk in the Legislature would cost the
citizens of Kennebunkport between $410,000 and $620,000 more in the next fiscal
year, with an equivalent savings to Kennebunk. These increased costs would be
over and above the compromise that was reached in 2005.
having just got in from work late, I could not attend. afternoon meetings should be banned. Naran, please, any insight to offer. I'm wondering if the Port people even bothered to attend......... though I have no idea why they would bother. NO only has two letters
Your wish is granted:
It was very interesting. Don Fiske and Ruth Fiske (Don's wife), Nathan Poore,
Parker Dwelley were there from the Port.
Parker told Barry Tibbetts off in no uncertain terms, for spreading false
information on the state reval numbers, among other things. (Barry didn't
deny it). Parker said he wants Barry to publicly correct the misinformation, in the
papers.
I made several statements that I saw a witch hunt already starting against
the Port board among our town administration and employees, trying to say
that the Port board were cheapskates, and I wanted it to stop.
I also said that Kennebunk hadn't done a reval for 25 years up until 2003,
so Barry's statements we were subsidizing the Port were false. I said
that the state says we're at 86%, which Barry had falsely misrepresented as
being 100% in his calculations.
Ruth Fiske also made some really good statements about how $300K wasn't
enough to have the towns divided over, and a lot of people agreed.
She made Barry tell us what $300K from the Port would take off the Kennebunk
mill rate, and he said it would be about 20 cents per thousand this year. (Whoopee!)
Parker and Don both said the Port had done enough already, and they weren't
willing to change the agreement. Again, nothing but silence from the Kennebunk town administration.
After lengthy discussions with the public and various board members, the District Finance
Committee said their recommendation to the full school board tomorrow would be that the school board should seek transitional money to help Kennebunk from Augusta, but no more from the Port.
So, one can hope Kennebunk's town administration will now abandon the attempt to get mo' money from the Port as well.
Thank you Naran.
It appears again no one had the gumption to tell the SAD to cut it's budget in a meaningful way.
We're leaving that one for you, since the rest of us have been doing nothing else for the last five years. I await your efforts with great anticipation.
:wink:
In the meantime, the school board meets for their first public input meeting on the budget tonight, at 7:00 at town hall, in Room 301.
The selectmen, on the other hand, will be meeting in Room 306 at 5:30, first to discuss an unnamed proposed development with the Economic Development Committee.
Then at 6:30, the selectmen will be meeting in a proposed executive session to discuss the school funding debacle. We have informed them the proposed executive session would be improper, since we believe it does not meet the state criteria for such. We believe any such deliberations should be conducted in public.
Should be an interesting evening all around.
It is becomng icreasingly difficult to keep up to date on these meetings by the selectmen, as this one you report I can find listed nowhere on the town site. suprise suprise. Are we required to visit town hall everyday to check up on them?
as for the sad state of the SAD, it wouldnt be the first time I have asked that question.
another good supper ruined :(
The school board this evening confirmed the recommendation from the Finance Committee - any monies needed to bail out Kennebunk will be sought from Augusta, not from the Port.
So, it's official. Put it to rest, all y'all at Kennebunk town hall. Figure it out for your own selves. We done told you and told you. Y'all didn't listen, did y'all?
(sorry, still in "grits mode" from the "Why Do We Live in Maine?" thread).
FYI on the executive session issues - after questioning the selectmen on what appeared to be an illegal session at the All-Boards meeting March 2nd, with no admission of wrongdoing or apology from them, complaints have been filed with the AG's office.
Last night's executive session to discuss the school funding debacle was another example of the sloppy way in which this board approaches the entire issue. The "public meeting" required to enter executive session was hastily held in a hallway, out of sight of the general public. We were waiting for them when they entered the meeting room, and when the board was asked to justify their reasons for the executive session, instead of responding to genuine concern for the law from residents, the attitude was one of irritated entitlement. It was "what are you doing in here," and "you've said your piece, now leave."
We reminded them again of their failure to observe the law the week before, and reiterated our position - we will not tolerate further violations and callous disregard for the rights of the public to know what should be public business.
This entire board needs a reminder - while you seem to think you're somehow exalted, and busy ruling your fiefdom, it ain't so. You were elected by the public, and you can be recalled by the public.
Fair warning.
Options to offset school tax hike are few
By Jim Kanak
jkanak@seacoastonline.com
York County Coast Star
3/9/06
KENNEBUNK — The reasons behind an unexpectedly high increase in the town of Kennebunk’s share of the cost of the MSAD71 school district for the 2006/2007 year have come into focus in a series of meetings over the past week.
http://www.seacoastonline.com/news/yorkstar/03092006/news/91710.htm
Also - stellar LTTE from Kristi - great job! (sorry, not online).
There was also an excellent article on all of this in yesterday's Journal Tribune (3/8/06). Again, not online, sorry.
This new funding formula favors the "rich" towns who in general don't have school age kids. Since the Democrats enacted LD1, and they are supposed to be for "the little guy" why was this done? If income taxes are based on an ability to pay (assumed by the income level), then why is school funding different?
Did someone get a kick-back to change the formula?
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The latest word is that instead of the 8.2% increase on the school tax portion of your Kennebunk bill for next year, you may assume an 8.7% increase.
Negotiations continue on the ramp portion of the LD1 disaster for Kennebunk/Port, but the All-Boards meeting tonight at the fire station on North St. in the Port promises to be very entertaining. Both town's boards of selectmen, and the school board are meeting to hammer out their differences, or tell one another to pound gravel.
7:00, come early for the best seats, right up front where the vegetables will be flying. Suggest that all attending bring their own fire extinguishers, and copious amounts of Tums.
:wink: