Muradian Op-Ed piece on Education

submitted by David Muradian

As the next State Representative for the towns of Grafton, Northbridge and Upton, one of my top priorities will be securing funds to enhance the education our children. Massachusetts is the birth place of American public education, and as such, we should be ensuring that every school in our district is a great school. To do so we must fund local aid, analyze and adjust the education funding formula, and ensure that the state fund special education at a higher rate.

Funding from the state to our cities and towns is supposed to help fund many different aspects of local budgets, but most importantly these dollars should be coming back to our municipalities to enhance our roads and schools. While our state budget has grown by $10 billion dollars in the last 10 years, local aid has continued to see a decrease. In fact, since local aid sat at its highest levels in Fiscal Year 2001, we have seen a decrease of almost $300 million dollars. In addition, dollars that should be coming back to our cities and towns from lottery prize money is being diverted to the general fund. This is unacceptable. Our State Legislature should be demanding that these funds are returned to our cities and towns.

In 1993 the state passed the Education Reform Act. As part of this transformation, the state was supposed to look at the way in which funding was given to each city and town every two years, to make sure it is being done in an equitable manner. This has not been done since 1993, and while many of our towns have to pass overrides to fund our schools, the Commonwealth has yet to do their part to examine the formula, which would bring more dollars to our towns. Instead, the State continues handing down one unfunded mandate after another. I will never vote to burden our schools with unfunded mandates and will work to make sure that the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) is held accountable to reevaluate the education funding formula.

One of the biggest budget concerns for our local school districts is the cost of Special Education.  It is unfortunate that our Federal Government has skirted its responsibility by not adequately funding the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) which was originally enacted in 1974.  This caused states across the nation to have to fill the void by finding ways to help our school districts with these extraordinary costs.  In fiscal year 2004, the Massachusetts Legislature created the Special Education Circuit Breaker Law.  In short, according to the DESE, the threshold for eligibility is tied to four times the state average foundation budget per pupil as calculated under the state’s education program, with the state paying 75 percent of the costs above that threshold.  This has been a huge help to our districts but is it enough?  I feel we can do better.  I strongly believe that the threshold eligibility should be changed to three times the foundation budget.  This would allow for further reimbursement which then allows for districts to fund other educational programs.  I do believe that we can afford this by looking at reforms to the way the state does business. In fact, I would push to explore the possibility of FULLY FUNDING the Special Education Circuit Breaker, where the federal government and our state pick up the costs.

The Commonwealth’s budget continues to reach new spending heights every year, and the funds allocated for our children’s future continue to dwindle. While dollars are wasted everyday on Beacon Hill through fraud and abuse, our children and communities suffer. As your next State Representative, I will fight to ensure that our hard earned tax dollars are rightful returned to our communities to make sure our schools are great schools, where we are educating our students to their highest ability, and relieving our communities from any unnecessary mandates and overrides.