County can't afford schools

The Sentinel

Montgomery County simply can’t afford Superintendent of Schools Jerry Weast’s budget demands, according to Councilman George Leventhal (D-At large), who spoke Monday evening at the annual operating budget meeting hosted by the Montgomery County Council of PTAs.

“Let me just say that one of my biggest regrets as I look back on my years on the county council is that we did not set aside more when times were good,” Leventhal said. “What we don’t have is a cushion, and we literally ran out of cash in the spring.”

Weast proposed a $2.6 billion plan in December to accommodate more than 3,300 new students next school year, or a 2.8 percent increase over last year’s $2.1 billion budget.

“We are not going to fund his budget request – we don’t have the money,” Leventhal said.

He estimated that if Weast’s budget requests, as is, were fully funded by the county, it would represent 62.3 percent of total county spending. When the budget for fiscal year 2011 was approved the county allocated 57 percent of the budget to MCPS and still fell short of the state-mandated “maintenance of effort” law, which requires the county to meet a per-student budget each year, regardless of the ever-increasing student population. The state was able to make up for the difference, but the process of deciding on a budget last spring pitted the county council against Weast bitterly...

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