By law, school districts must put their budgets to a public vote every year — unless local voters opt out of this budget validation process. The idea behind this added layer of voter approval, which began in 2008, was to increase public participation in the school budget process. In reality, however, a small percentage of voters typically show up at the polls to vote on school budgets.
The recent experience in midcoast Maine’s Regional School Unit 13 serves as an example. On Tuesday, a $25 million budget for the five-town district was approved by voters, 341-295. It was the second try by RSU 13 officials to pass a budget for the school year that starts in just a few days.
District voters in June rejected a budget proposal that was about $1 million larger. About twice as many people voted in that election, with a final tally of 793 against the budget and 524 for it.
Does that mean the majority of the district’s voters were happy with the budget and didn’t feel they needed to go vote? Or did they want even less money spent but gave up on the process? Or did they just not care? The budget validation process doesn’t answer these questions.
What we do know is that in many communities a tiny fraction of residents is deciding how millions of dollars will be spent. In addition, as school budget voting stretches to multiple rounds, subsequent votes commonly attract progressively fewer voters. In RSU 13, the turnout for Tuesday’s vote was just 6 percent. As of last November, more than 10,000 registered voters lived in the district while fewer than 1,000 decided the outcome of the final school budget vote.
In northern Aroostook County, SAD 27 remains without a budget after voters in late July rejected a budget of nearly $12 million for the second time. The vote was 377-319 against the budget. In this case, 15 percent of registered voters showed up for the school budget vote.
The Deer Isle-Stonington school district has scheduled a fourth vote on its proposed budget, which has been revised after different versions were rejected three times at the ballot box.
In Bangor, less than 9 percent of the city’s registered voters cast a ballot in June to approve a $44 million budget for the city’s schools. The election cost about $5,000, according to the city clerk.
Every three years, local voters have a chance to end this charade. Their next chance will come next year.
The budget validation process began under the controversial school district consolidation law during Gov. John Baldacci’s administration. Under the law, communities must vote every three years whether to keep the public budget validation vote. Most vote to keep it. Easton, Beals and Coplin Plantation are exceptions and have done away with budget validation votes. Given the low turnout for school budget votes and the expense of carrying out an election, oftentimes with the school budget the sole item on the ballot, this makes sense.
Mainers love the notion of local control. However, residents often leave decisions about school spending — i.e. control — up to a small fraction of their neighbors.
The same residents already have elected a school board and city or town council or board of selectmen, who also vote on school budgets and often direct that specific changes be made. All residents have the opportunity to show up to school board and council meetings to make their opinions known. Many also have the chance to vote each article up or down at a district budget meeting.
But few people take advantage of these opportunities to have a voice in school spending. When the interest level is so low, they might as well — as they do with most state-level decisions — leave the spending decisions in the hands of the officials they have elected to represent them.
