What's the expected total town budget this year?

The music program will not be re instated unless town meeting approves the school budget. Please get involved to make this happen.
Herb Chasan

Any word yet on voting for the town financially supporting the full day kindergarten?

5 mill increase over last year......that should go over real well....
Jim@ccfiile.com

Herb.....You will be whistling another tune when your taxes go up another $500.00
next year, and the next, and the next.......You must be very rich.
You can't keep increasing expenses without an adverse effect on the residents.
Getting all the new TMM in place to do the school's bidding is going to bankrupt the town. I guess a good bankruptcy is what we need to wake everyone up.
Bring it on.....
Jim@ccfiile.com

Tell you what, Hiersche is leaving, tell him to leave and leave his salary behind for the "Children". Herb is getting all his school cronies in town meeting. Some who don't even want to be part of town meeting in the first place. Let's see how long all these people last. Totally irresponsible to recruit people for the town meeting who are for ONLY for the school cause. Not to diverse if that is the case. To make it worse, a big effort is being made to get those CONSERVATIVES in Town meeting OUT of those office so you can help the School cause. You all should be ashamed of yourselves. You try to get out of Town meeting people that have great attendance records and you want to replace then with jumokes who will probably go to one meeting and then stay home.

Joe Rizoli

Jim - Can you please name a single town or city in the history of the United States that declared bankruptcy, and whose financial problems were attributed to funding a strong public school system? On the contrary, every town that has declared bankruptcy has one thing in common - failing public schools. Joe - What makes you think school supporters are ONLY interested in the schools? Is it possible they love the town, and also think a great town has great schools? And a review of town meeting attendance from last year (available on town website) will quickly show you that some of your beloved CONSERVATIVES missed quite a few town meeting nights last year.

So...what is the total Town Budget this year?

Thanks. So the assumption is that we'll spend every penny of the $224.9M in revenues?

The reason I ask is that "back in the day" we spent about 50% of the budget on the schools. So this school budget is actually less than that.

There are plenty of towns that have gone bankrupt....Here are a few.
http://tinyurl.com/7y45fqw
Close to home we have Springfield....Lawrence, and some others coming close
Jim@ccfiile.com

As to attendance for town meeting. NO TOWN MEETING MEMBER should be re-elected unless they have at least 75% attendance, maybe as low as 50%. An attendance sheet should be available for the voters to see or printed on the ballot. before they go to the polls.
That's my opinion. That's why you're elected..... to be at the meetings. As to stupidity, how's this one, I was on a committee not even for a year and someone who thought he had more "experience" who was a newly elected TMM took over my spot. My brother being the Chair of the Precinct said to this person that it would be nice for this person to try to make all the meetings for that committee because these committees have a problem getting quorums. He became very upset "don't tell me what meetings I have to go to" he said, Nice attitude for a NEW town meeting member.

Town meeting should be DIVERSE, different types of people. But Town Meeting is becoming a SCHOOL town meeting. Shouldn't be that way. But that's OK wouldn't be surprised that the town goes receivership from the State for the retirees health insurance. It's going cost 10-15 million for every year for twenty years. Yet, the school's want more money.... and NOBODY is talking about this financial 200 million dollar golden goose scrambled egg.

Joe Rizoli

Jim - First, you are incorrect about Springfield going bankrupt. It has suffered an economic decline for the past 40 years due to the loss of its manufacturing base, but actually has a bit of revitalization in the last few years. In any case, the economic difficulties in Springfield has NOTHING to do with school funding.
Second - Did you read the link you sent? It lists 9 cities and counties that are going bankrupt, and lists the reasons behind their problems. Not a single mention in any of those cases about school funding contributing to their problems. I asked you to name a single municipality that has gone bankrupt due to school funding, as you predict will happen to Framingham. I'm still waiting, and if you can't come up with a specific example, please stop your fear mongering. Strong schools make strong towns.

Ray - There already is an easy way. Town meeting attendance (at least for 2011) is readily available on town website.

This is a nice start: http://www.framinghamma.gov/Weblink8/DocView.aspx?id=19381&&dbid=0

Now we just need someone to make it easily usable. Percentages would be great.

I wonder if we can get the source spreadsheet.

The list is just data. Personally, I've never understood Jim's separation of SCHOOL vs TOWN in Town meeting. It's like saying LIVER vs KIDNEYS in the human body. They're part of the same thing and artificial grouping don't make sense to me.

@ Ray - as a newer resident here I am also bewildered by the Schools vs Town thing. Except,when you are buying a house - then the first question anyone with kids has when evaluating a town is "are the schools good?". Parents will give up a lot of other criterea, or pay a higher price for a house in order get into a town with quality schools. The bonus is that it pulls up the overall repuation of the town for all buyers. And now that I am here I care about BOTH the schools AND the town. There really isn't a separation in most people's minds. However, the schools really are the canary in the coal mine for potential buyers.

I'm glad that you understand that if schools succeed the town succeeds.
Being a fly on the wall at the Ways and Means meeting last night you will be surprised to hear we have 4 schools which are labeled Level 3 schools.
In other words not good, level five is shut them down. 40 percent of the town is consdered poor as indicated by the kids who get free lunches. Again not good. The school committe is very dedicated and caring don't get me wrong but these problems are beyond them now.
Woodrow Wilson is so bad they have to change the curriculum just to see if it will raise the bar,for the kids. In other words that school is in pretty bad shape learning wise. Again dedicated teachers etc etc...but problems beyond their control.
You folks should attend these meetings with us you will learn a lot.
But bottom line.....We are in big trouble if we don't get our fair share of Chapter 70 money. We are a unique town with some unique problems. We also are not getting compensated for our (unfunded mandates) and if not addressed soon we are going to have some serious problems, that I see no ending too.
Now if you don't think that is going to stop people from moving to the town then think again. The poorer people will come in droves but not the more affluent.
That is not what you want happening. Free kindergarten will open up the flood gates alowing even more of the poorer people to move in. Just more weight to the hay stack.
Jim@ccfiile.com

JIm: If you read the education articles on this site and not just commented on possible immigration status of the students you would have known that 3 elementary schools (Barbieri, Brophy & Wilson) and one middle school (Fuller) are level 3 schools.

Sue....I know that. That's what was said at the meeting.
I never said this had anything to do with immigration status in my post.
Even though I feel it does have a bearing on it.
Jim@ccfiile.com

Jim - I am so glad you are now understanding the scope of the problem. The schools are in serious trouble. Many factors for this, but it is clear the cuts over the past several years have gone too far. Something like 150 positions cut. Beverly Hugo posted a nice piece in the patch a while back outlining all the cuts, but for the first time in the history of Framingham, standardized test scores were below the state average. The cuts HAVE made a difference, it is not like the schools were spending money frivolously. And that is why there is such a push among a broad base in the community (not just Herb as you suggested) to return the Framingham school system to at least the same quality you had when you went through it. Free kindergarten is becoming the standard in Massachusetts. Last year 80% of kindergartners were in a full-day program. 192 (out of 306) districts offered ONLY full-day K (so over half of all districts.) 284 (out of 306) offer full day as an option. So it is simply NOT the case that by Framingham offering full-day K people are going to be flocking to Framingham ("opening the flood gates" as you said). Framingham has been behind the curve with this and is only NOW proposing what other surrounding towns have ALREADY been doing.

Well, if you want more middle class and affluent people to move to town, then you better show that the town leadership supports the schools. Otherwise they will take their tax dollars and buy in a to a town that does. Again, this is what confuses me do much about the taking of sides as being for or against school funding.

Actually, I'd like to add to my last comment. We should be probably be focused on attracting anyone who is interested in quality education for their children, as these are people who are most likely to also be concerned about the general quality of life in their community - regardless of their financial status.

The real reasons why this is all happening isn't being addressed. We have opened ourselves up to attract a lower income status of people. The illegals being one, which I won't fully address here.
They have filled up the lower grades to the point that a lot of these kids don't have the intellectual capacity that they should have. English not being their first language is a big issue here.
That being said....the amount of these kids around 800 give or take and climbing is pulling down the rest of the schools. The schools these kids are in are actually dumbing down not smarting up.
If you put a sparrow in a cage with a parrot that sings guess what...the parrot will stop singing and the sparrow will keep chirping.
That is what is happening here. You will never get the results you want as long as this continues.
Continued........

No matter how much money you throw at it, no matter how great the teachers are you can't make children smarter than they are, especially if they are English impaired. There is too much to overcome and the results are we have 4 Level 3 schools. To prove my theory....look at Fuller School....the kids there would of been
the English impaired kids ten years ago and they have grown up.
This is approximately when the illegal invasion started out in full force.
This is just my take on it unless someone can prove me wrong.
That being the case we have to figure out how to fix it. Throwing more money into the pot IMO will not. Many schools in the troubled cities have way more money than we do and they are still dealing with underachievers.
This a social problem bigger than us all, and it's going to need bigger and better ways to deal with it.
To sum it up....We're reaping what we've sowed from the last ten years. It has finally caught up to us.
In the mean time if we can get more money go for it, even though I don't think that is going to solve the problem.
Jim@ccfiile.com

THE SCHOOLS. The never ending spiral that is insatiable. The schools in NJ have thrown BILLIONS into their schools and they still need more money and their academic achievement hasn't improved. Framingham now is realizing that the altruism it had for a certain group of people is going to bite them. It is already happening. Framingham past for allowing ANYONE to come into the town with welcome arms has dumb down our schools. Level 3 Schools is something to be proud of? No connecting the dots for the HUGE influx of Illegal Immigrants that have been coming to this town since the early nineties? NO CORRELATION for that? Now we have a huge influx of Kindergarten kids coming in. How many of those are English impaired? These kids have to be accumulated by more bilingual programs and teachers. The town brought this upon themselves. The Welcoming Proclamation though well meaning set this town up for a financial mess. When the standards of the town are lowered what do you expect when you make the town a SMOC SCHOOL town? Some years ago we were told that on bulletin boards down in Brazil advertisements were being made to come to Framingham. Who to contact, the legal help....... and they came, boy did they come.........That's WHY we are at level three for the schools. Connect the dots.........That tsunami now has hit the beach.

Joe Rizoli

Cutting $20 million and 150 positions from the schools isn't exactly what most would describe as "throwing money at the problem".

Diane....The money isn't the issue, the problem is.
jim@ccfiile.com

Jim and Joe, I'm afraid that you're the one who has to prove the conjecture that the schools are suffering from an increase of immigration and students with language problems.

My advice is that you go find some numbers to back up your point. Please find numbers for immigration, students with remedial language classes, the test scores of those students, and the rankings we'd have if these students were not included in the mix. Then trend this over five years.

Perhaps you have a point, but you've got to do the work to prove that point. You can't make random claims that are obviously rooted in your own prejudices against immigrants.

On the other hand, if you do the work, you could provide a real service to the town, opening people's eyes to hard data that they are ignoring.

But, you need to do real work with real numbers.

To build on Ray's point, there could be a double whammy here. Yes, the demographics, and therefore the needs of the district, have changed. And instead of analyzing and addressing those issues head on, the cuts not only ignored those issues, but compounded them.

Killing the schools will not make the immigrants leave. It WILL prevent the town from attracting the people you deem desireable. As town meeting members and long time residents your energies might be better focused on supporting initiatives that will slow any further decline in the schools or neighborhoods.

Ray...Just take a look at the enrollments in the schools.
Woodrow Wilson 80% Portuguese. The other schools following a high percentage.
There is a huge infusion of young immigrants (mostly) from parents of illegals that have come into the school system over the last several years.
The break down is there for all to see. Most of our new young kids in the system are from the illegal immigrant community.
Will the schools admit that? Don't think so. They will say they don't ask any questions. Fine! Then we'll come to our own conclusions based on the fact that a lot of the kids are "English Impaired" Not only are they English Impaired they can't even speak in their own native language...talk about a double wammy!
Lets stop there.......Enough complaining....
Continued........

As I was saying.....
So..... since we have the little kids here how about getting the Feds or the State to kick in some money for us considering we would be considered a hardship case, as we are having a hard time paying for them. So far our Reps are not getting us ANY money.
Let me set all of you straight here......I don't care if there are a million immigrant kids in our schools I'm just concerned about why WE are paying for them and the bill for them isn't dispersed throughout the state, Country whatever.
Why should we be the major recipients of the kids and have to pay for them, and the other towns get off scott free and saying I'm glad Framingham is the town where the kids are ending up and not our town.
Lets get ALL the towns to kick in. it isn't fair for us to be the town that gets all of them and then have to pay for them.
Are we all clear on what my thoughts are here?
If they are going to stay lets have them (or someone else) for that matter chip in and pay. It's not fair for us to foot ALL the expenses for these kids.
Jim@ccfiil;e.com

Now finally we can tease something actionable out of the rhetoric. Maybe you can partner with those who are advocating for the schools to get more Title 1 funding? Help with the case to support updating the formula to reflect the change in demographics?

I'm all ready to go! This is what I said at the meeting with the W&M the other night.
I just think the people advocating for the schools are going about it the wrong way.
I had to let people know what the problem was, those advocating now have to go after the money but not from us Framingham people.
So far they haven't gone after the right pocketbook, and that is the reason people like myself get a little bothered by it all.
This is a Unique Framingham problem...... but it has to be addressed by more people out of Framingham. I think the good people of Framingham have spent enough.
Jim@ccfiile.com

Jim@ccfiile.com