Borough wants school elections in November

BY VINCENT TODARO
Staff Writer

SPOTSWOOD -- With so few residents bothering to vote in the school election each April, the Borough Council wants to move the vote to November.

It is believed that merging the school election with the general election will increase participation, said Board of Education Vice President Alan Bartlett.

At its meeting Monday night, the Borough Council passed a resolution supporting a state Senate bill that would allow this to happen. Part of the same bill would also allow certain school districts to determine their budgets without polling residents.

Council President Curtis Stollen said he's all in favor of moving school elections to November.

"This April election is widely ignored," he said.

In Spotswood last April, just 830 of the borough's 4,700 registered voters cast ballots in the school election.

If the bill becomes law, there would be a cap on school budgets exempted from residents' votes, Stollen said. Residents would be able to vote on anything above the cap. Also, school districts would need to go out to vote if there were special appropriations for capital budgets.

The cap would likely increase each year, similar to the inflation rate.

If a school board did not have to go out for a vote, this would also likely help in the preparation of budgets, Stollen said, because the board need not worry about forecasting changes or cuts stemming from a defeat at the polls.

Stollen said voters in Spotswood get worn out from the election season, as school elections are in April and the borough's nonpartisan elections are in May, followed by primaries in June.

"We're still hoping Assemblyman [Patrick] Diegnan can move the borough elections," he said.

Bartlett said that by holding the elections in November, the school district would save about $20,000, which is the cost of having the April election, during which time board members are elected and the budget is voted on.

"I'm completely in favor of [the change]," Bartlett said. "It will save money, and hopefully increase voter turnout."

Because voters are already at the polls to vote in federal, state and county elections, it is more likely they'll cast a vote in the school election.

Spotswood's school board has a notorious history in the April elections, as the budget has been defeated every year since 1994, with participation levels typically hovering around 10 percent of registered voters.

Bartlett said it is no sure thing that budgets would be more likely to pass should elections be held in November. Still, a larger turnout would give the district a better idea of how the population really feels.

"I'd rather see more people out there. It at least gives us a chance to see if [the budget] is popular," he said.

The April budget vote was relatively close: it was defeated 448-382. The council subsequently chose not to make cuts in this year's tab.

"If we lost by 4,000 or 5,000 votes, I'd say there really was a mandate," Bartlett said.

Bartlett feels April's vote was closer than most because the district did a better job of informing residents on how tight the budget was, he said. A budget cut ordered by the Borough Council the prior year also weighed heavily.

"I think there was some recognition that the prior year's cut was very big and really impacted us," he said.

"The press we got woke people up to the fact kids would get less if people didn't vote," he said.

He also feels that residents are impressed by changes in the district, such as the creation of new advance placement classes and more teacher training.