Many communities throughout the state are facing double digit increases in their school property tax rates this Town Meeting. In response to this situation, Gov. Peter Shumlin is throwing his support behind the concept of consolidating Vermont’s school districts.
"Anyone who says that property taxes are not too high in this state is not living in the Vermont I am living in." Governor Peter Shumlin
Shumlin is not endorsing any specific plan at this point, but he says he’s encouraged by the work of the House and Senate Education committees.
As a first step in controlling costs, the governor hopes local voters will carefully examine their school budgets next week.
“I’m not going to tell voters what to do,” Shumlin said at his weekly news conference. “But I do think that as we go into this collectively we’re all in this one together and obviously, Vermonters should scrutinize their school budgets and make sure they’re making affordable decisions.”
Shumlin said the basic problem facing the state’s education system is that student enrollment has declined by more than 15 percent over the past decade but school expenses have gone up.
"Anyone who says that property taxes are not too high in this state isn%u2019t living in the Vermont I am living in." Governor Peter Shumlin
“Anyone who says that property taxes are not too high in this state isn’t living in the Vermont I’m living in. Property taxes are too high,” said Shumlin. “And we’re in this one collectively. We should all be working to try and find ways as we have fewer students in our schools to have our tax rates reflect that fact.”
A proposal being developed by the House Education committee would encourage schools to form larger districts in the next few years. The proposal would replace all the local school boards in the new district with one single board.
The bill gives communities until 2019 to make these changes. After that date, a state mandated restructuring process would be put into place. Shumlin thinks it’s a good approach to take.
“We know we have a structure of governance and a challenge going forward; this isn’t an easy problem to solve,” said Shumlin. “We’ve got small schools, small communities, but we’ve got an awful lot of schools with very few kids in the classroom and one teacher.”
The restructuring plan might have the support of the House Education committee but it faces additional scrutiny in the Senate.
Sen. Dick McCormack, D-Windsor, is the chairman of the Senate Education Committee and he says he has yet to see compelling evidence to support a major restructuring plan.
