Funding Our Schools

Dear Rehoboth Citizens,

It should be obvious to everyone by now that Rehoboth is not able to afford its assessment every year. We have had to supplement our contribution to the District with funds from Free Cash (not a good practice), and finally, when that was no longer an option, we had to have an override. The District, as well, had to supplement its revenue with $1,250,000.00 from its E&D this fiscal year (also, not a good practice).

Rehoboth can afford its required minimum contribution of $13,234,960. However, we all know that our District spends over the required amount to fund our schools. No one expects us to run our schools on just the minimum. I think we can all agree that the foundation budget formulated by the state is woefully inadequate.

Starting in FY2015 the District requested $2.7M over the minimum. For FY2020 the District is requesting $6.8M over the minimum required—an increase of just a little over $4M since 2015.

Since Rehoboth starts with a $13.2M minimum for FY20, when we add on the requested $3.96M for Rehoboth’s portion of the above minimum it really affects our ability to pay what is expected.

Adding $2.84M to Dighton’s minimum of $6.55M doesn’t hurt quite so much, since their base is much lower than Rehoboth’s. Maybe that is why Dighton has less difficulty funding their assessment each year while Rehoboth struggles.

The issue is not Rehoboth’s commitment to education or that we don’t want to support our schools. We simply can’t afford the current assessment method used by the District. We are going to run into this problem year after year.

The solution is an easy one. We have to fix the assessment method in a new, amended, Regional Agreement. It needs to support a fair and equitable division of costs to our towns. The Rehoboth Selectmen and the Rehoboth Fincom have presented such a method to the School Committee, and members of the Dighton Fincom and Selectmen.

The chairman of Dighton’s Fincom has said that he would not get up at his town meeting and ask the residents of Dighton to pay more money than they already do. Yet that is exactly what the Dighton leaders are asking Rehoboth’s chairman of the Fincom to do.

If we really want to “Save Our Schools” we need Dighton leadership to change the assessment formula in our new agreement. That is the only way we are ever going to afford the education we want for our students.

In closing. . .
At the School Committee meeting a couple of weeks ago, a citizen of Rehoboth addressed this committee and ended her remarks saying that she was ashamed of her town because of the town meeting vote. I would like to point out to her that the Town of Rehoboth pays 65% of the operational costs of the District. Yes, that’s right. We pay 65% of the Superintendent’s salary and 65% of all of the Central Office expenses. Rehoboth has, by the way, 58% of the students. We have in recent years passed 3 debt exclusions to fund school repairs and updates. We passed an override last year. Rehoboth spends 2/3 of its revenue on our schools while spending 1/3 on our town.

I’m not sure why any of that is reason to be ashamed of her town.

Susan E. McBride