66.0°,
Overcast and Breezy Vote down this year's budget
To the Editor:
As Tuesday’s West Hempstead school budget vote approaches, we are once again presented with a $54,397,183 budget ($1.5 million higher than last year) and asked to support it.
Looking back at the year that passed, we cannot help but realize that our economy has not recovered from the recession. Homes are being foreclosed or are sold in short sales, remain empty or are being rented to multiple tenants. The small businesses — the “backbone of our economy” — crushed by ever-rising taxes and the faltering economy are closing. Our seniors, who have not received any COLA increase in their benefits in the last two years, are feeling the effects of this recession even more. As for our young college graduates and professionals, they are struggling to find permanent jobs with benefits.
Yet we have heard at school meetings some people advocate more spending for “the children, the future of America,” more education spending to “maintain the value of our homes” and the ever-shameful comment “if you cannot afford it, move out of West Hempstead.”
Our financial situation is not going to improve in the next few years. Albany is broke. The Auditor’s Report available on the West Hempstead School District website indicates our contribution to the Teachers Retirement Plan increased 39 percent this year, and the contribution to the NYS Employee Retirement Plan (other staff) increased 60 percent. The auditor states, “these are trends expected to continue.”
This means we will be asked to pay even more in the years ahead. Now is the time to all come together and decide our priorities, chart the future of our community and the future of our children, even if that means we have to make difficult and painful choices.
Americans have always taken pride in being compassionate, just and honorable. The best education for our students, the future of our country, might be the one they will learn outside the classroom, facing the realities of life, striving for ideals, learning that present-day sacrifice means:
