New Lebanon voters will have a second opportunity to weigh in on the school district budget tomorrow.
About 59% of voters approved the budget during last month's vote. Under normal circumstances, it would have passed. But new Lebanon schools were asking for a 6% tax levy, which is slightly over the legally allowed cap. Districts are allowed to do this, but when they do, they need a supermajority, or 60% of voters to support the budget. So 59% wasn't enough. And given New Lebanon's relatively small population, in practical terms, it means the budget failed by just seven votes.
Which is why, on a recent Thursday evening, in an office above a takeout restaurant in New Lebanon, a group of parents was working the phones. They'd been at it for a couple hours when I stopped by. Empty pizza boxes were spread across desks, and the windows were open. It was hot, and they still had a ways to go.
Tistrya Houghtling helped organize the phone banking session. She has two kids in New Lebanon Schools, and also serves as New Lebanon's Town Supervisor. "So, we've gotten through two lists," she told me. "The first list was about 55 numbers, the second was about 300." As we spoke, she began thumbing through the third list.
If the budget doesn't pass, the district will go to what's known as a contingency budget, which will mean deep cuts to sports, music, and arts, as well as the elimination of several positions. So far, the people Houghtling had spoken to were supportive of the budget.
But then she got on the phone with a guy who told her he's sick of having to pay extra every year to fund a school where enrollment is down about 40% over the last two decades. The guy said he didn't think it was fair for the taxpayers to spend more money every year, especially when everybody's bills are going up for other reasons.
"I, myself, am a single mom that lives paycheck to paycheck, so I completely understand," Houghtling said into the phone. "My electric bill has tripled in the last year, heating fuel has gone up. Many people are on fixed incomes. I get it. I guess, for me, I just don't think that the children should be the ones that have to suffer."
For every call Houghtling and other parents are making on behalf of the budget, Link Corsey is working against it. He lives in the hamlet of Malden Bridge, where he's posted yard signs urging his neighbors to vote no.
He's sent out at least 100 mailers to voters, trying to make the case that the district is being irresponsible with their money. "I mean, the school is great," he told me. "They got wonderful teachers, and everything - they're so well-intentioned. Everything's great there. It's just too small to be fiscally, you know, reasonable."
With the steady decline in enrollment, Corsey would prefer to see the new Lebanon schools shut down, and the students absorbed by the surrounding districts. Otherwise, he says, with property values going up, and student numbers shrinking, it's just going to keep getting more expensive to educate fewer kids.
Corsey also doesn't like the fact that after the budget failed the first time, the district decided to just try again with the same proposal. "To me, the fact that they were unwilling to make any concessions is arrogance. So, to me, now that's kind of personal."
For Britt Buckenworth, the stakes of the vote on Tuesday are even higher. "My understanding is that if it doesn't pass, my job is one of the top jobs on the cutting block."
Buckenworth is a librarian at New Lebanon Junior-Senior High School. She also teaches literacy classes, and runs a food program where students learn to cook, and then host free community dinners. She's worried that if her job gets cut, programs like that will go away with her. "Losing that connection with the community and all the activities that I do with the children is like...it's gutting me. It is gutting me."
Grace Kalisz is a sophomore at New Lebanon Junior-Senior High School. She's on the swim team, and sings in the school chorus. Both programs are vulnerable to cuts if the budget doesn't pass. She's feeling really anxious about the budget vote. "I'm in a lot of honors classes, and those are har. When I get to choir, when I get to swim practice at the end of the day, it's a space in a community where I can be myself. I think I would just be losing who I am if I didn't have those."
