Thoughts on Money Used for the Clinton County School System During the last two years the public in Kentucky has paid increased state income taxes, an increase in the state sales tax from 5% to 6%, and a 3% school tax added to public utilities including water, phone, electric, and cable TV. In Clinton County a large increase in property tax assessments has occurred. We are told that all these increases are necessary to improve the quality of education in the state. Lord knows the quality of education needs to be improved and I guess money is probably necessary to do that. In Clinton County the total school budget has increased by about 1 million dollars per year for each of the last two years with the 1991-92 budget at somewhere around 7.3 million dollars. That's small potatoes in some places but people around here get big eyes anytime a dollar sign has all them commas and zeros following it. Superintendent Carver told a recent school board meeting that when they prepared a budget for the coming school year they could figure a total cost of $40,000 for every 1% raise they gave each of the approximately 250 school system employees. By the math I learned in this school system a number of years ago, that means that the total payroll is about $4,000,000. Of these 250 employees about 130 are certified educators. The lowest paid of these gets over $17,000 per year and the highest paid around $60,000. Last year of the 180 or so school districts in the state our county ranked 60th from the top in teacher pay, or in the top third. Of all surrounding school districts our teachers were the highest paid. The school board, the majority of which were elected this last year, decided to give these school employees an 8% raise in pay for the coming year. They had received a 10% pay raise last year. Gary Farley, President of the local education association, according to the local paper, said they had expected 10% this year but he thought they could live with 8%. These are the same school board members who ran on a platform, or so they told me, of running the school system for the students, not for the employees. Doris Farley, on a committee at the Albany Elementary to raise money for playground equipment, reported at a recent school board meeting that they had raised $10,000 and expected to need about $12,000 to build a playground at Albany Elementary for Grades K-3. This week's Clinton County News reported that the playground could now be built with total donations and fund raising of $15,000. The paper said that much of this had been raised by candy sales by teachers, parents, and students. To me this indicates that 5 to 9 year old children were instructed in their classrooms to go to their parents, friends, relatives and neighbors to sell candy so that they could have a playground. If past experience is any guide they were probably put under quite a bit of social pressure to sell as much as possible. When I asked a year or so ago why the Albany Elementary could not have soap dispensers in the bathrooms a school official told me that it was impractical and too expensive because these young children would tear them down within two days if they were installed. When I asked why the school system could not provide a decent school bus environment so that I did not have to drive my son to and from school twice a day, I was told that to do so would probably require monitors to ride on the school buses. Later at a school board meeting it was requested that monitors be hired to ride on all busses hauling four year old children, and only on those busses, regardless of whether or not there was a discipline problem on the particular bus. It was explained that if they were hired in this way some Federal money would be available to pay most of the monitor's salaries and it was implied that this would be too expensive otherwise. When I asked a couple of Principals why they spent a lot of effort pushing soft drinks and snack foods in their schools they told me that there was no money available to buy needed supplies such as paper for the photocopy machine and indeed, the photocopy machine itself, if they did not raise it on their own. It has been common practice for years for teachers to collect 10 to 12 dollars from the parents of each child at the beginning of each school year to buy classroom supplies. A couple of times my wife and I have chipped in with other parents to buy air conditioners for the classrooms so that our children could be comfortable enough to study during hot weather. A parent who I do not know, but applaud nonetheless, got up at a school board meeting earlier this year and pleaded with the board to provide some money for playground equipment, and as he put it, for the kids. He did not get any response from the board members. By my calculations, if the school employees had gotten a 7% raise instead of 8% this year, they would have gotten an average of $160 per year less and the school system would have $40,000 to spend per year every year for playground equipment or school supplies or whatever. Deducting costs of transportation, food, capital outlay, federal chapter I and II programs, maintenance, and miscellaneous expenses from last year's budget of $6,388,446 leaves $4,247,397 budgeted for administration and instruction. $4,000,000 spent on payroll is 94% of this amount. A parent recently suggested that a study skills specialist be hired to work with the teachers and students in the school system on improving study skills. This parent said that maybe we could have some type of community fund raiser to pay this person's salary. We seem to have become conditioned to having fund raisers and donating to the school system if we want improved education for our children. It is as if parents and taxpayers are not allowed to touch or question that $7.3 million that came from our taxes. When I asked a question about school policy at a school board meeting, I was later called at home by the husband of one of the teachers and told to keep out of things that were none of my business. I may be naive but I thought that maybe the use of that money was some of my business and I even went so far as to tell some people that I thought maybe we should try to spend a little of it on the education of the children. Now, I do think that people should be well paid for doing a good job, so if our students are getting an education as good as or better than those in 2/3 of the state then maybe we aren't overpaying. I also realize that a lot of school employees are underpaid for the job they do. I suspect though, that for every 20 who are underpaid, 40 are overpaid. I just feel that a lot of parents and taxpayers might want to take the above facts and figures into account when they evaluate the school system and the performance of elected and appointed officials. Duane Bristow August 15, 1991