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March 9, 2006 • Vol. XXIX • No. 28

State Aid Could Be Lower—
Commissioner Davy
Acting Commissioner of Education Lucille Davy on March 3 told school districts to continue developing their 2006-07 budgets using the current year’s state aid amounts. Her message, however, contained a strong note of caution that “final numbers could in fact be lower than the current year amounts.”

“We recommend that you plan conservatively,” she stated.

Davy’s message to school business administrators lines up with comments that Governor Corzine gave at NJSBA’s Legislative Conference on Monday.

Calendar Adjustments Davy indicated that the Department of Education might issue a state aid update prior to the governor’s budget message, which is set for March 21. Statute requires final state aid notification to school districts within two days of the governor’s budget message.

To accommodate the late release of final state aid figures, the commissioner has made adjustments to the budget development process and time lines.

March 14—Deadline for submitting preliminary budgets to county superintendents (originally March 6).

March 27-30—Budget hearing dates (originally March 22-29).

Four days prior to budget hearing—
Advertisement of budgets for public hearing.

  • Since advertisement will take place prior to receipt of state aid figures, Davy said that districts may use the public hearing process to revise and adopt their budgets, if necessary, to reflect final state aid figures.
  • Districts’ advertised budgets must include a statement indicating that the proposed budget and tax levy is based on tentative state aid amounts and will be revised, if necessary, following release of final aid figures.
  • Districts may have to advertise prior to receiving county approval of their tentative budgets. In such cases, they must also disclose that fact in the advertisement.

NJSBA Resources For more information, school districts can consult the state Department of Education’s official 2006 school election/budget calendar and  the 2006 edition of NJSBA’s “School Election: Questions and Answers.”