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School Law Penalties, Repeal Dominate Legislative Hearing in Augusta
Legislature Poised to Let Voters Act on Repeal Petition

By Will Tuell
Downeast Coastal Press, April 7, 2009

The Legislature's Education and Cultural Affairs committee, which has been wrestling with school reorganization for three sessions, heard eight hours of testimony from school and municipal officials, fellow legislators, parents, teachers, and public policy specialists during a series of public hearings April 1. Topics ranged from how to handle the law's penalties to outright repeal, and associated bills were ultimately shelved until after voters weigh in on a citizen's initiative to strike the law down either in June or November.

MEA, Others, Decry Penalties, Urge Their Delay/Repeal

The day began with a discussion about the penalties the law imposes. Opponents argued that the penalties unfairly target rural areas that tended to opt out of consolidation, while proponents argued that they had been promised a share of the proceeds. Most of the bills up for consideration involved delaying the penalties by either one or two years, or eliminating them outright.

“Some referendums have failed because of fear of loss of local control,” said Rep. Howard McFadden (R-Dennysville) in urging legislators to support his bill that would allow non-compliant towns an additional year to consolidate school systems. “Others have rejected the same because of increased costs—which is true of most of them. And others are so remotely located that they cannot meet the 1,200 minimum student population. We must remember there are 107,000, or 54.6 percent, of Maine students that reside in units that were exempt from the law, so they weren't subject to any penalties whatsoever. That's over half the state. Most all the areas that face penalties appear to be in the poorest areas of the state that can ill afford to lose any part of their General Purpose Aid (GPA).”

McFadden, who also spoke in support of other bills that would repeal the penalties outright, said that, in his view, some areas only voted in favor of consolidation because they “had a gun to their head.” “Some areas did vote yes because of 'you do as I say, or you're going to pay.' That's a big piece of it. There's a lot more that would have voted this down if it wasn't for these penalties. That's why we need to eliminate [them].”

Repeal of the penalties also received high profile support from the Maine Education Association (MEA), a labor union claiming more than 25,000 members in the state's K-12 education system, as well as the community college and university systems.

“This issue [school reorganization] has clearly been a divisive one,” said MEA President Chris Galgay. “The voters have spoken. Many cities and towns have voted in the affirmative and are proceeding through the process of merging their districts. Many other cities and towns have rejected the idea and have decided that they would rather maintain their existing school district. We can all debate which group chose the correct path, but regardless of which side you're on, we need to ask ourselves who we are penalizing?”

Galgay contended that Maine students, in addition to taxpayers and communities that opted against consolidation, are being penalized.

“Although a property tax increase or any tax increase during these tough economic times would be difficult for any Maine citizen,” said Galgay, “I maintain that the penalties are really imposed on a group of Maine citizens who were never afforded the opportunity to weigh in on the issue. The real victims of any penalties on our public schools are the students who enter our classrooms everyday. We all have an obligation to ensure that every student in Maine—regardless of what town they live in—receives equal educational opportunities.”

While most spoke in favor of penalty remediation, several constituents from areas that consolidated expressed concern that doing so would delay Maine Education Commissioner Susan Gendron's plans to redistribute penalties to school districts that voted to merge.

“In addition to the loss of people, we've had immediate and substantial expenses involved in consolidation, and we've had immediate and serious losses of revenue that we are now struggling with our school budget,” said Brenda Kelty, a regional planning committee member from Freeport. “Now it looks like the money that we had been promised, the deal that had been made, is maybe not going to be there. I have people who say that we made a deal. And we expected that we would cover our expenses and costs [of reorganization] would be covered, and we would make this commitment and come out of it okay—in the short term. And we're not okay. Now I don't like penalties. I don't like the idea of taking money from kids in one part of the state and giving it to kids in another part of the state, but the reality is that if this bill passes and penalties are eliminated, the children of Freeport are going to be penalized. We have got to find someway to make sure that injustice does not happen.”

Proponents of Repeal Have Their Say

While legislators considered a wide range of bills dealing with collective bargaining, and special exemptions to the law, two bills that would repealed school reorganization generated the most public input as the hearings dragged into its sixth hour.

“Our association has been consistent in its opposition to mandated school consolidation,” said Erica Kimball, president of the Maine School Boards Association (MSBA), “because school board members have questioned from the start the premise that it would save taxpayers money and improve the quality of education. The law does not take into account the substantial costs of negotiating unified collective bargaining agreements, or the legal expenses incurred at forming these new entities. It did not count the loss of federal subsidy for rural school districts that are now too large to qualify for that funding.

“Trying to make the mandate work has taken valuable time and attention away from our most important mission of improving education. This distraction will be with us for some time, because we are only now discovering many of the issues that were not adequately thought through when the law was put on such a fast track.”

Skip Greenlaw, the Stonington man who spearheaded a petition drive to repeal the law, also spoke out against the 2007 measure.

“I feel passionate about this because I think Maine people are hurting,” said Greenlaw. “I was in the Legislature for six years. I worked for Governor [Joseph] Brennan. I am passionate about government. I have defended government ad nauseum in my community for many many years. I think the school consolidation bill is one of the worst pieces of legislation that was enacted. I've never done anything like this [repeal petition] in my life, but I was so completely blown away when I came up here to talk to people about what was going on. They weren't listening to people in the communities, and I just couldn't believe it. The people who consolidated are in as much trouble as the people who didn't consolidate. There's something terribly wrong with this law. I don't want to cause a lot of hard feelings, but people are hurting.”

Principal Tony Maker of East Machias’ Elm Street School likened the consolidation law to lobster fishing in rough weather in calling for the law's repeal. “It's time to cut the rope, and retie it,” said Maker. “This law needs to be repealed and replaced with the things that work for the areas that have already consolidated. Give the other areas an opportunity to move forward. You've heard story after story of areas that have found cost savings, but because their governance structure did not fit the prescribed governance set forth by the state, they [are] going to be penalized. You have areas that were in collaboration—other areas that have stopped—and they're not doing it any more because they can't find the governance structure to work. You've got a whole House and a whole Senate that needs to be convinced that it's time to cut the rope and retie. It's time to move on, it's time to get back to educating children.”

East Machias Selectman Kenneth “Bucket” Davis testified that his town was part of an SAD until several years ago, but that by forming its own municipal school unit, and sharing administrative costs with neighboring units, East Machias could both save hundreds of thousands of dollars and have control of its own school system. Davis briefed the committee on efforts between Unions 102 and 134 to share a central office, saying that all towns involved would save money yet retain authority over own municipal school systems.

“This law is flawed. It needs to be repealed, and the sooner the better,” said Davis. “I will share with you that my board of selectmen are also consulting with an attorney, and if push comes to shove, we're looking to take this to federal court, because these penalties are unconstitutional.”

Jonesport selectman Howard “Buddy” Mills also spoke in favor of repeal. “Our local school is doing everything it can to save money,” said Mills. “I think this thing puts us between a rock and a hard place. The two towns I'm here representing—Beals and Jonesport—will do anything they can for their children. We all want the best for our children, and I hope you use a lot of common sense when you make your decision [on repeal]. We've gone from an RSU to an [AOS]. I go to all these meetings and I'm pretty much dumbfounded. We have nothing to work with. No figures, no numbers. It's very difficult.”

Education Commissioner Opposes Repeal

Education Commissioner Susan Gendron countered that repeal was not the answer, and that the state planned to move ahead with implementation of the law. “Eighty-one percent of the students in the atate of Maine are in conforming districts,” said Gendron. “For those of you who weren't here, the governor's original proposal wasn't 80 [units], it was 26. Through the process, which we all work on on a daily basis through our democratic way, that proposal was modified with a target of 80 [units].”

Gendron said that while savings were elusive, the research her department has done was based on consolidation efforts in other states.

“Even though at this point we are not seeing savings, the research that was gathered for the Education Committee at the time documented from other states that had gone through reorganizations [indicated that] the money that was projected for savings was over a period of time and was based on actual reorganized school districts in other states,” said Gendron. “It was not something that the department or our researchers pulled out of a hat. It came from research that was provided.”

Gendron said that repealing the law would “dramatically disrupt the work that has already been accomplished” and that “the voters in those communities had the opportunity to move in this direction [consolidation]. Those plans were carefully crafted. One of my concerns is that we're talking about repealing when we've not given the communities the opportunity to operationalize the plans that they have diligently worked on. In many cases, the driver of those plans is the educational program where they have recognized that some of the savings will come later. What they wanted to promote was the educational advantages for our children. For those reasons, the department opposes [repeal].”

When Sen. Elizabeth Schneider (D-Orono) suggested that voters didn't really have a choice in whether to consolidate or not, given the penalties and the way the process was devised, Gendron replied that in her view they did.

“I would argue that we absolutely did give citizens choice,” said Gendron. “Was there a consequence for that choice? Absolutely. I would also clarify that the governor did not propose the penalties. The penalties came from the working group of the Legislature who proposed the penalties. The governor and I did not propose the penalties. I think it's critically important that we continue with this proposal.”

After hearing the testimony, legislators opted to shelve all bills related to the law until after citizens have decided whether or not they'll repeal it outright at the ballot box later this year, guaranteeing that the Legislature will again take up consolidation in 2010, against the backdrop of a gubernatorial election.