North East PA Online

For North East Township and North East Borough

Let’s Commit to a No School Tax Increase Budget This Year

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The $4 million grass replacement project is water under the bridge, it’s done, the money is spent, so let’s move on. It’s time, right now, to think about the school budget, so we don’t run into the usual end of the school year surprise with a budget that can’t be balanced without a big tax increase. The costs the rest of us face every day for everything from groceries to electric bills mean we have to watch where the money goes and sometimes cut back and the school district has to readjust their budget and spending just like everyone else. School enrollment continues to decline and the district can’t spend like the good old days of growing student bodies and a booming economy, that’s not reality and their ability to raise taxes because they refuse to restrain themselves, is no longer reality either. It’s time for the school district to commit to and promise us a no tax increase budget.

Schools are spending our money, not theirs

Everyone needs to remember, public schools are government schools and just like every other part of our government, the money they spend, every single penny, comes from taxpayers. If they spend more money than they have, they just raise our taxes and take some more. That has to stop, right now.

Justify and prioritize

Everything in the budget, every expenditure, needs to be justified, why should the school district spend money on this? Since everything will have someone supporting it, after all, there’s a reason it’s there in the first place, we then have to set priorities. Sometimes we have to say, “Yes, we understand why you believe this is important, but these other things are more important.” Then we cut it out. Priorities, otherwise everything gets included, our money gets spent, our taxes go up and the same thing happens every year. Well, no more. This year, right now, let’s just stop.

If unexpected expenses come up, before the board agrees to the expenditure, decide what will be cut to pay for it. Don’t just add it to the pile. If we add this, we remove that. Priorities. It’s a simple and powerful concept.

Remove the bloat

If you attend the school board meetings you’ll see long lists of spending items grouped together and voted on as a block and it’s easy to spend $10 thousand or $20 thousand with hardly a thought. Some items you may not be familiar with cost more than you might think. You have to closely examine the agenda and backup documents to see some of these things, which is why the agenda and backup documents should be published 72 hours before the meeting so we can see where the money goes.

Accountability and common sense

None of this is hard to understand, it’s just common sense. The school district must justify what they are spending, where and why, and they must commit to a balanced, no tax increase budget. The school district is ours, we pay for it. It’s up to all of us to watch what they do, ask questions and demand answers. Let’s make sure we’re getting exactly what we pay for without any added surprises.

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Filed Under: North East School District Tagged With: , , ,

  1. Everyone has the right to know what their government is doing.
  2. Transparency is expected in all government meetings and daily operations.
  3. Everyone working in the government works for, and is answerable to, you and me.
  4. All laws, regulations, ordinances, budgets, audits and other public records should be freely available, preferably online, for citizens to examine without special fees and paperwork before they can do so.
  5. When municipalities seek bids for contract work, all bid documents should be available online, free of charge. Printed copies, if requested, should be offered at cost.
  6. Agendas should be posted online a minimum of 3 days before public meetings take place allowing interested citizens an opportunity to hear discussions and offer input on matters important to them.


Comments

  1. Yes I agree this school board and administrators need to be reined in and live within their means like the rest of taxpayers have to do

  3. We often hear about administrators getting “bonuses” yet never see this in financial
    Statements. Is this statement a lie? Rumor? Are bonuses covered up or called something different on paper? How about no bonuses for “doing your job” and no new taxes.

  4. Thank you for presenting the common sense approach to this overspending. Tax payers need to be aware & take a stand. Get our heads out of the sand.

  5. Unfortunately I would bet another tax hike is on the horizon, their unabated spending is the norm, we are just wallets in the board’s eyes..

  6. I agree with everything you are saying here however, I don’t see this behavior changing volunteerly by the district.
    This needs to be addressed at the legislative level. Act 1 which allows the district to raise our taxes without public input by a vote as long as they stay within the percentage set by the state year to year needs to be changed making a fair system both for the tax payer and the district.
    The state auditors office recently looked into this and found that school districts were raising taxes while sitting on large cash reserves.
    Look at NESD, they fall into that category. Mr. Fox calls it “good business” sense. Anyone could run a great business if they were legally allowed to take peoples money without their consent.
    Bottom line, as long as the district can legally raise taxes without the consent of the people it seems that’s exactly what they will do.
    While I believe addressing the school board and perhaps being able to persuade some members to vote no to certain items is great when it comes to the overall budget we need to put a bug in our representatives ears. Right now they don’t see it as a priority because no one is addressing it, we’re just complaining on social media!

    • Act 1 is a real problem. The 2025-2026 numbers were just published (downloads an Excel file) a few days ago and NESD is allowed, according to their spreadsheet, to raise taxes 7.6 percent without requiring a taxpayer referendum, and if they wanted to exceed that figure, they could ask for an exemption from the limitation and it would likely be granted. It’s a very high number and gives the school district a starting point to show taxpayers what a great deal they’re getting because they didn’t ask for that much.

      It’s a number based on a convoluted formula, passed during the Gov Ed Rendell administration in 2006, that makes it appear there’s a very fair and objective way to find out how much they can raise taxes, however, no legislator came up with that formula, it was written by education lobbyists and then passed by the legislators. It was sold as property tax relief, but that never happened.

      Yes, legislators changing or eliminating Act 1 might be a good start. Otherwise taxpayers are just a piggy bank that can be broken into time and time again.