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BY TOM HESTER SR.
NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM
Picture 26 New Jersey school districts, each with a school board and each without a school.
Now, picture them gone.
Gov. Jon Corzine Tuesday signed legislation that enables county superintendents of schools to eliminate so-called non-operating districts and merge them with the school districts where the children from those 26 towns actually sit in a school and learn.
Within a year, non-operating districts such as Victory Gardens, Teterboro, HiNella and Tavistock will be just another part of New Jersey's fiscal history. But no schools will close.
At a bill-signing ceremony in Haddonfield, Corzine said the legislation is a step toward school district consolidation. "This legislation that I am signing is another important component in our effort to share services and reduce the size of government," the governor said. "By merging with neighboring districts, students will receive the same quality education as before, and we will also begin to bring more rhyme and reason to our system of school districts across the state."Non-operating districts are typically those with a small number of students that are sent to another district via a "send-receive" relationship. The non-operating district is charged tuition for the students it sends. Non-operating districts have school board to assemble the budget for the district.
"In closing these school districts, our students will still receive the same level of education they deserve," said Sen. Jim Whelan (D-Atlantic), a sponsor of the bill.
The legislation, S-3000/A-4141, provides the county superintendent with the authority to merge a non-operating district with the district in which it participates in a sending-receiving relationship.
There is an exception for a non-operating district that has a sending-receiving relationship with more than one district or the sending-receiving relationship is with a district considered to be in need of improvement. Under these circumstances, the county superintendent will decide which district the non-operating district will be merged with based on the district that can accommodate the merger.
The legislation also accounts for board of education representation. For non-operating districts merged with districts, which have mayoral appointed school boards, the board will have the same number of members as the board of the district with which it was merged plus one additional member appointed by the mayor or chief executive officer.
For non-operating district merged with a district with elected boards, it will have two members. Then, any vacant positions on the board will be filled by members elected at-large by the voters in the regionalized district.
"Average New Jersey taxpayers don't care whether they have a local board of education, so long as they have a voice in the decision-making process," said Sen. James Beach, (D-Camden), another sponsor of the legislation.
"These hard-hit taxpayers care about the bottom line, and the bottom line in New Jersey is that property taxes are too high. We need more common sense initiatives which reduce the cost of government without reducing the level of access and accountability that people really do care about in the Garden State."
Overall, New Jersey has 616 school districts with 1.38 million students.
And the phenomenon of school districts without schools is actually not unique to New Jersey. Nationwide, there are 285, including 50 each in Maine, Vermont and Massachusetts.
