The ongoing Prop H saga

During the recent 4/25 BOE meeting the board approved a plan to reallocate some $2.2M in Prop H fund away from Middle School and High School programs and instead use the funds to help cover increased teacher salary costs. The meeting notes were a bit vague on exactly what was approved, but now more details have emerged.

Bonnie Eslinger writes in The Examiner, School board approves Prop. H funds for teacher raises

[...]Although a community advisory committee recommended that a portion of that third discretionary pot, $2.28 million, be earmarked for counselors and extra high school support staff for next school year, the district will take an advance on those Prop. H funds, using them instead to help pay for the teachers' retroactive pay increase.

With the average teacher estimated to receive about $1,000 in back pay, the costs of the compensation package for this school year is about $5.4 million, according to the district.

In addition, $1.9 million of unspent funds from this year's Prop. H money — designated for elementary school counselors, nurses, social workers and learning-support consultants — are also being considered to pay for the teacher raises. According to district officials, the money is currently unspent due to hiring difficulties.[...]

Union officials have bristled at the assertion that the new compensation package is creating a budget shortfall for the district, countering that teachers have gone for nearly four years without an increase and that the financial difficulties are due to declining enrollment, poor spending priorities and lower-than-expected state revenues.

The Examiner also published a damning editorial on the same subject, Diverting funds burns S.F. voters

Proposition H, a 2004 ballot measure that provides tens of millions of dollars in escalating city funding for San Francisco public schools over the next decade, was promoted to voters as being almost exclusively for arts, music, sports, library and preschool programs.

While a clause in the ballot summary referred vaguely to “general education purposes,” the message by proponents was clear: Prop. H money would be directed toward programs that directly helped children in San Francisco public schools.

Voters responded to the initiative with strong support, in an acknowledgement by the electorate that the usual primary funding source for public schools — state government — was not sufficient to provide the kind of educational support needed for The City’s children.

The latest diversion of Prop. H funding leaves a bad taste, and makes it more likely that future funding measures will be greeted with increased cynicism as voters wonder about the motives behind them. That’s a damaging message to send — and a rueful lesson to learn.

Many of us have argued the merits of spending Prop H money on teacher salaries over on the SfSchools List. There is some evidence that Supervisor Amiano had this kind of spending in mind when he helped write the ballot measure—in particular, the mysterious "third third" of the funds have very few strings attached and may have been designed for this purpose. Most people in the school community agree on the merits of giving our teachers a well-deserved raise. But I and many others agree with the Examiner here. This was not how Prop H was sold. This is not what voters had in mind.

Instead of gutless waffling on schools closures, the BOE needs to take bold action to find significant budget cuts. Sure they need to lobby for more funds and find new sources of revenue. But that will not help the budget due in June. Reduce headcount. Close more schools (too late!) but don't mine the Prop H vein to fund teacher salaries.

This is a terrible time to be double crossing the voters.