It has been our position since day one that Gov. John Baldacci’s school consolidation proposal effort is a poorly conceived, hastily enacted, and horribly mismanaged piece of legislation that was never given a hearing in front of the people most affected.
Our belief is Baldacci waited until after he was safely elected a second time to break out the school consolidation concept in his second inaugural speech because he knew it wouldn’t fly during the general election.
The proof in the pudding is that the governor never called for a legislative vote on the subject. He just budgeted the savings and proceeded to spend the allegedly saved money leaving the legislators to figure out how to actually make this thing work. While they made something that has to work, (because not working isn’t an option) we think they failed every single Maine citizen by failing to calling the governor to account for this budgetary maneuver.
The sum total of this mess is that the various school boards have done what they could with what they have been given to work with. Considering they have been asked to develop a budget on the fly for a body that doesn’t exist (and won’t until July 1), with less and less state revenues for support, all within a painfully short time frame, it’s a miracle that they have done as well as they have.
In a way, we don’t blame the voters of RSU 12 for waylaying the proposed budget during their public hearing in Whitefield last night.
They may have dramatically compromised their school’s ability to deliver the educational goods, but we can understand their ire. They are being asked to pay more money for something that was supposed to save money, and which may or may not actually save something down the road (Dirigo anyone?) and last night was their first chance to actually weigh in on the numbers.
We believe RSU 12 school officials did the best they could with what they had. They know, everybody knows, the economy is sputtering, nobody’s job is guaranteed and there is still no effort in Augusta to deliver tax reform.
This is the elephant in the room, and by all accounts, next year is going to be worse financially than this.
Now at least our turn to weigh in is next Tuesday and we can approve what’s in front of us, which is better than doing nothing, or we can reject what has been proposed, which is still better than doing nothing, but neither option is cause for joy.
