Regional school district should be fair when determining funding

It appears that Marlboro’s Township Council is once again seeking to contest the current tax levies for the Freehold Regional High School District. Does the council realize that property taxes only comprise 55 percent of FRHSD funding, and Marlboro’s portion of that is 24.9 percent? That works out to about 13.7 percent of the total FRHSD budget, which appears to be a much better education value than Marlboro’s K-8 district provides.

Education funding in this state is derived from four sources. They are property taxes, state funding, federal funding and other funding, which includes grants and donations. Wealthier school districts may not realize the significant impact that state revenue has on education funding in less affluent communities.

Funding is based on the socioeconomic status of a municipality as determined by the state, called a demographic factor group (DFG). A review of the 2001-02 funding sources by school district illustrates the variances in funding by municipality:

• Colts Neck - DFG-I. Federal and other funding — 6 percent. Percentage of budget from property taxes — 86 percent. Percentage of budget from state funding — 8 percent;

• Farmingdale - DFG-DE. Federal and other funding — 10 percent. Percentage of budget from property taxes — 57 percent. Percentage of budget from state funding — 33 percent;

• Freehold Borough - DFG-CD. Federal and other funding — 7 percent. Percentage of budget from property taxes — 40 percent. Percentage of budget from state funding — 53 percent;

• Freehold Township - DFG-GH. Federal and other funding — 3 percent. Percentage of budget from property taxes — 85 percent. Percentage of budget from state funding — 12 percent;

• Howell - DFG-FG. Federal and other funding — 4 percent. Percentage of budget from property taxes — 55 percent. Percen-tage of budget from state funding — 41 percent;

• Manalapan-Englishtown - DFG-GH, Federal and other funding — 3 percent. Percentage of budget from property taxes — 63 percent. Percentage of budget from state funding — 34 percent;

• Marlboro — DFG-I. Federal and other funding — 6 percent. Percentage of budget from property taxes — 74 percent. Percentage of budget from state funding — 20 percent;

• FRHSD - DFG-GH. Federal and other funding — 8 percent. Percentage of budget from property taxes — 55 percent. Percentage of budget from state funding — 37.

It would appear by this data that every community, except Freehold Borough and Howell, are paying a smaller percentage of the total high school budget in property taxes.

Perhaps the most equitable funding strategy for the FRHSD would be to assign each town a percentage of the total FRHSD budget that is equivalent to the percentage of students that town sends to the district. Each town would then apply all four sources of revenue (i.e., property taxes and state funding using municipal allocation figures provided by the state, federal funding and other revenue) to meet the percentage requirement.

This method of determining funding would ensure every community only funded its fair share of the total FRHSD budget. In addition, wealthier communities would not reap the benefits of state funding intended for less affluent municipalities.

Jeanette Smith

Howell