If the overall Montgomery County Council backs its education committee, the county’s school system will come away with a $1.982 billion operating budget for next year — a sum that’s $6 million below school leaders’ hopes, yet $14 million above the county executive’s heavily contested suggestion.
Council members grappled with the committee’s recommendation earlier this week in preparation for today, when the final numbers for all county-funded entities — including the school system — are released.
Council President Marilyn Praisner has been careful to note that even today’s figures are not final, as budget staff members do their figuring over the next week.
Still, the allocation announcements have been months in the making, particularly the school system’s, following a handful of work session and town hall meetings.
On Tuesday, representatives from the school system defended their $1.988 billion budget as bare bones and crucial, their claim since Superintendent Jerry Weast unveiled the record-high total late last year.
“We have to think about academic sustainability just as much as financial sustainability,” Weast told the council as he directed members to consider the need to keep up with schools globally as well as to close the achievement gap between white and minority students. “This is a cogent plan to address those needs. This budget passes that muster.”
His comments come after a highly contentious budget-wrangling period that has included outrage from the school community about County Executive Ike Leggett’s recommendation to leave off $20 million from the school system’s budget plan.
Leggett’s stance has been that his budget would fund 99 percent of the request.
But according to the education committee’s assessment of school-funding patterns, if the council went with Leggett’s budget, it would equate to the largest reduction from the school system’s request in the past 13 years.
Education committee chair Michael Knapp on Tuesday also said that Montgomery County is slated to have 3,000 fewer students in the next fiscal year. At the same time, though, “the number of students with needs is going up, creating a new challenge,” he said.
