Friday, February 20, 2004
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Friday, February 20, 2004 |
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Fayette school board to lobby at Capitol By J. FRANK LYNCH The seven highest-ranking administrators in the Fayette County School System will be joined by all five members of the Board of Education in a trip to the state Capitol Tuesday to lobby against more school funding cuts. Superintendent John DeCotis will attend with six of his top managers: Vice Superintendent Fred Oliver; assistant superintendents Pam Riddle and Wayne Robinson; Director of Personnel Judy Byrd; Special Education Director Clemene Ramsey; and Finance Director James Stephens. School board members Janet Smola, Lee Wright, Terri Smith, Marion Key and Greg Powers have all made arrangements to attend the meeting as well. They are scheduled to have breakfast with the county’s legislative delegation at 8 a.m. in Rep. Virgil Fludd’s office, Room 512 of the Legislative Office Building across from the Capitol. Fludd is hosting the breakfast for the second year, and said all ten of the lawmakers representing the county — three in the Senate and seven House members — have been invited and planned to attend. Fayette school officials were disappointed at last year’s breakfast when the local representatives appeared to ignore the needs of the school district. While a couple of them popped in and out, the majority of the 10 didn’t show up at all. From there, the Fayette group will go to the Capitol Rotunda for a mass gathering of the 6th District Geogia School Board’s Association annual meeting. Ordinarily, one or two school board members would make the annual visit to share concerns about school issues and state funding. All five Fayette board members committed to going this year to send a stronger message about proposed budget cuts from the state. That message: Enough is enough. In their annual planning retreat Jan. 31, board members heard grim news about the prospect for more cuts. “It’s not going to be an easy year,” said Stephens at the time. “We will need to look at everything we do, from top to bottom, systemwide, from materials to bus transportation to our facilities.” This week, department directors were due to turn in their budgets for the coming year, which starts July 1. Next Friday, principals will face their own deadline for submitting requests. All have been advised to stay frugal. Stephens plans to present a first glimpse of the 2005 budget in March. Fludd, the only one of the 10 lawmakers who actually lives in Fayette County, restated his committment Tuesday to see that school funding statewide be maintained. Gov. Sonny Perdue had already announced he was slashing education spending by about $200 million this year, while ordering a 2 percent raise for all teachers statewide. Local districts would have to foot the bill for the pay raise. That’s on top of the $5.5 million in cuts from the state absorbed by Fayette taxpayers since 2002, Stephens said. A $179 million miscalculation in Perdue’s original budget draft had education lobbyists scrambling, and a House version of the budget approved Wednesday restored that money to school needs. But Fludd said it also proposes delaying the governor’s promised raise by six months, from an effective date of July 1 to Janunary 1, which builds in some breathing room. Fayette County did similar in handing out a half percent raise in January. Fludd said there’s also a move afoot to eliminate property taxes as a means of funding schools, instead going to a statewide sales tax, an idea that’s admittedly burdened with flaws. The present operations budget for Fayette County schools is about $148 million, up from $143 million in 2003. Of that, about 70 percent goes to pay salaries and benefits. Stephens told board members in January that he’ll do everything he can to avoid recommending layoffs, but didn’t completly discount the possibilty.
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