Assembly Speaker Joseph Roberts has formally introduced legislation that would eliminate the state’s April school elections and would move school board member elections to November.
The bipartisan measure was released on Monday by the Assembly Education Committee. Under the bill, people would not get to vote on the school budget unless it exceeds statutory spending or tax levy limits.
The bill was cosponsored byAssemblymen David Wolfe (R-Ocean/Monmouth), Jerry Green (D-Union) and Wayne DeAngelo (D-Mercer/Middlesex.) Roberts wanted the bill numbered A-15, because, on average, only 15 percent of voters come out to the polls for the April school elections.
This is the main reason for the introduction of this bill – voter turnout. In North Brunswick, only 11 percent of registered voters came out this year, and in South Brunswick there was only a 10 percent turnout. In Middlesex County, 10 of 23 municipalities voted against their school budgets.
“In Plainfield, there are over 18,000 registered voters,” Green said. “1,037 came out, around 5 percent.”
DeAngelo thinks things would improve if things were moved to November.
“It would triple, if not quadruple, the amount of voters that would attend,” he said. “This has a large impact to your life. I’m really dumbfounded on how something this big can get such little attention.”
Green said that it has become increasingly difficult for school board members to run effectively.
“The campaigns have become very expensive,” Green said. “They often have small groups who have their own personal agenda in the town or district.”
The bill would not have the public vote on the budget. Why change this?
“Because we have a cap now,” Green said. “We have more control over certain districts just wasting money, which in the past was a major concern.”
DeAngelo added that when the budgets fail, it places an unfair burden upon the town council because they have such a short time to make cuts.
“I had 30 days to deliberate and decide on what I’m going to cut,” DeAngelo said, a former member of the Hamilton Town Council. “It’s really not financially responsible to do it that way. [The school budget] is $170 million more than the municipal budget.”
Matthew Speesler, vice president of the Board of Education in South Brunswick, said he would only support legislation to move the school elections to the general November elections if it did, in fact, only include voting on school budgets if it exceeded the cap.
“Elections are costly to the school districts- we budget approximately $36,000 for elections,” he said. “There is always a concern that school board elections would become political if moved to November. I am all for saving money for the district but feel strongly that if our budget is fiscally responsible. … There should not be a need to have it approved by the voters. Municipal and county budgets are not voted on – why should school budgets?”
DeAngelo said he is open to other ideas to improve voter turnout, but he has not heard any.
The bill was released by the Assembly Education Committee with a vote of 10-2. Speaker Roberts will now decide when to post the bills for a floor vote.