School officials focus on property tax reform Changes in funding outlined at convention Thursday, October 26, 2006 • BY JOHN MOONEY • Star-Ledger Staff From places as disparate as Jersey City and Millburn, they packed banquet-size meeting rooms to hear what was in store for their school districts. Nearly 1,000 school board members and administrators attending their annual convention in Atlantic City this week jammed two simultaneous sessions yesterday for an update on Trenton's ongoing property tax reform effort. There wasn't a lot for them to like. Education Commissioner Lucille Davy led one session, telling the audience that change was clearly coming in how the state funds its schools. A long-awaited retooling of the funding plan is still in the works, Davy said, but she offered hints that it would include incentives to consolidate districts and models of what schools should be spending. "There probably won't be anybody who comes away with all the money they think they will need, but we need to be realistic," she said. "Everybody will need to give one way or the other." Many in the audience agreed the property tax crunch had placed schools at a crossroads unlike any in recent memory, but there was little agreement to how it should be solved. Harrington Park Superintendent Adam Fried directly asked Davy where small, K-8 districts like his fit in Davy's vision of the future. In a state of nearly 620 districts, Davy said, the smaller ones are clearly not the optimal example of efficiency. And while praising the quality of Harrington Park's education, she said maybe it can be provided for less money. That didn't go over well with Fried, who attended the session with members of his local board. "It's very threatening, and that's too bad," he said afterward. "We're the (federal) Blue Ribbon schools, the (state) Star schools. We're the ones they should be patting on the back." Others admonished Davy not to back off the state's commitment to its neediest schools. Davy pledged not to, but she stressed middle-class districts facing many of the same needs also need help. "The kids at risk in Carteret, Rahway or North Bergen, they need the same kinds of preschool opportunities that they are getting in" the poorest, heavily subsidized districts, she said. The other session held down the hall featured three lawmakers serving on special legislative panels convened this summer to come up with proposals to ease the local tax burden. Among them was state Assemblyman John J. Burzichelli (D-Gloucester), who has co-chaired a committee looking at proposed changes to the state constitution. "We have had to think like a constitutional convention would think, which wouldn't be called to protect the status quo," he said. Burzichelli said among the proposals being considered would be direct tax credits to homeowners that would be significant. "I'll tell you right now, 10 percent would not be enough," he said. © 2006 The Star-Ledger. Used by NJ.com with permission.