TRENTON — Gov. Chris Christie has advised the education department not to release a report Tuesday which details how much New Jersey spends per pupil, over concerns it could hurt the state in a current legal challenge. Though Christie stopped short of saying the state would not produce the report, as required by law, he recommended Tuesday delaying it...
After the bill signing Gov. Chris Christie says that he was mislead by Education Commissioner Bret Schundler. TRENTON — Gov. Chris Christie has advised the education department not to release a report Tuesday which details how much New Jersey spends per pupil, over concerns it could hurt the state in a current legal challenge.
Though Christie stopped short of saying the state would not produce the report, as required by law, he recommended Tuesday delaying it while the state fights a lawsuit filed in June by a New Jersey education advocacy group.
"I’m going to (put) one legal challenge behind me before I buy myself the next one," Christie said. "I’m not so sure...we should be putting forward any report until we get a resolution of the current legal challenge."
An update is on the state board agenda for today, but no action is scheduled, according to Department of Education Spokesman Alan Guenther.
The decision has spurred more political jousting with state Democrats coming days after the governor’s firing of Education Commissioner Bret Schundler.
"Education is in a mess in New Jersey, and this just in my mind confirms that situation," said Assemblyman Patrick Diegnan (D-Middlesex), chairman of the Assembly Education Committee, who added the litigation is not a reason to hold off on the report.
"I’m suspicious that the department at this particular point is probably in chaos," he said.
Diegnan said he wondered whether the governor had confidence in the report.
The pending legal challenge was filed in June by the Newark-based Education Law Center, which charged the governor’s $820 million in aid cuts "indisputably violated" the state’s legal obligation to distribute funding based on a formula upheld by the New Jersey Supreme Court.
The state, in its response to the law center’s motion, said the decreases were unavoidable in a year when the state was "pummeled by a national recession."
Oral arguments have not been scheduled.
David Sciarra, executive director of the Education Law Center, said by delaying the review Christie "made the only appropriate decision that can be made at this point." Along with seeking to force the state to restore the slashed aid, or enjoining the state from using the formula, the center asked the Supreme Court to halt the funding formula review process.
"The formula has not been funded, so it cannot be properly reviewed," Sciarra said.
Steve Wollmer, spokesman for the New Jersey Education Association, the state’s largest teachers union, also noted the "turmoil in the education policy side in this administration."
"I think Schundler was the one assigned to work on school funding issues. How much work he had gotten done, I don’t know," he said, questioning why Christie would delay the report.
"What’s he worried about, that’s he not properly funding schools? That’s not exactly headline news," he said.
This report would be the first under the current school funding formula. State law calls for the governor, after consultation with the commissioner, to issue a report to the Legislature on Sept. 1 — and every three years thereafter — on what the cost should be of educating students to achieve the state’s core curriculum. The report should include a base per-pupil cost of educating a child, with that number adjusted depending on whether a child is economically disadvantaged or disabled, or needs English as a Second Language or other special services, according to the statute.
That base cost currently starts at $9,971 per child for elementary school, with further adjustments for middle, high school or vocational school, according to a spokesman for the Department of Education.
A panel of educators convened in August was asked to "look at the description of adequacy which serves as the basis for the school funding formula," according to minutes from the state school board’s Aug. 4 meeting. The districts ranged from poor to wealthy, urban to suburban, and included "the highest student performance with the lowest cost."
Several superintendents contacted said they were asked to keep the discussions confidential.
One Woodbridge School Superintendent, John Crowe, said it is difficult to measure the effectiveness of the school funding formula because state aid was reduced this year.
"The problem is, it is impossible to measure any effectiveness of the formula ... because the formula hasn’t been funded," he said.
By Jeanette Rundquist/The Star-Ledger and Lisa Fleisher/Statehouse Bureau