folkbum's rambles and rants

Except, apparently, in Florence County, where voters approved a measure to exceed the revenue cap yesterday:

The vote marked the fourth referendum since May 2004 on whether to exceed state-imposed revenue caps to pay for minimum programming requirements, safe busing and building maintenance, said Superintendent Jan Dooley. The first three failed, the latest in June.

Residents were asked two questions: whether they would approve the board exceeding the caps by $4.75 million over five years, and whether they approved the dissolution of the school district.

Only the vote on the revenue caps was binding.

In the final tally, 1,424 voted to accept exceeding the caps, to 1,253 against, while 443 approved closing the district compared to 2,210 who voted to keep it open, according to Kathy Holland, administrative assistant to the superintendent.

The district, with a current enrollment of 589 students, will now be allowed to collect an extra $500,000 in property taxes starting this year, an extra $750,000 next year, an extra $1 million in the third year and an extra $1.25 million in both and fourth and fifth years.

I've written about Florence before; its situation is a perfect confluence of decades of bad decisions, bad policy, and bad luck. Rising fuel prices (even amid record oil company profits) have been among the final stakes in the sprawling 500-sqaure mile district's heart, but several other factors apply:

• The decision--and this is one most school districts are guilty of making--to offer generous retirement packages years ago, in the theory that younger, less-experienced teachers would be cheaper. This worked out okay until . . .
  
• Double-digit percentage increases in the cost of health care every year for the last decade or so. This socks taxpayers twice, once for their own health care, and once to support those young teachers and all the retirees from the school district. The district feels the pinch because of . . .
  
• State revenue caps, which were coupled with the state's picking up of 2/3 of the cost of education and the QEO law, to create a straightjacket for districts across the state. Locked into increasingly expensive retirement obligations, accompanied by the state's reneging on the 2/3 promise in recent years, schools districts have found themselves squeezed in even more directions. Add to it the public's usual reluctance to vote to tax themselves more (see referenda 1-3 in Florence) and the disincentive contained in the QEO to save money on health insurance (Florence County probably doesn't have that many insurance providers to compete for the schools' business, anyway), and districts are so squeezed they just might explode.

Florence has dodged the explosion this time, but it won't be long until other districts start feeling the same pressure to do something. Sadly, the leaders of our state legislature will continue to focus on god, guns, gays, and, er, vouchers, since they make for better campaign issues. While they do, taxpayers, schools, and the future get closer to exploding.