A meeting with state representatives last week yielded a timeline where the school district will be fully funded by 2024–25.
Cherry Hill Public Schools is slated to receive an increase in funding from the state for the 2019–20 school year, according to initial figures from the state Department of Education.
The state Department of Education’s Fiscal Year 2020 state school aid figures have Cherry Hill receiving about $18.4 million in aid for the 2019–20 school year. This is an increase of about $1.1 million from the $17.3 million the school district received for 2018–19. Last year, Cherry Hill received an increase of $3.1 million in state aid.
The Fair Funding for Cherry Hill Public Schools group met with Assemblywoman Pamela Lampitt and Assemblyman Lou Greenwald on March 8 after the figures came out. During the meeting, Missy Lang, chair for the Cherry Hill Fair Funding group, said they received assurances that Cherry Hill and other districts would still be fully funded in about five years.
“They did give us a path to where we would be fully funded by 2024 and 2025,” Lang said.
According to the School Funding Reform Act state aid formula, Cherry Hill schools should be receiving about $29 million in state aid. In 2019, Gov. Murphy signed a new law, making changes to the SFRA to shift more money toward underfunded districts. After the passage of the law last year, a press release from Murphy’s office stated, “Over the course of seven years, aid to overfunded districts will be reduced and aid to underfunded districts will be increased so that all public school districts achieve their appropriate levels of assistance under the formula contained in the School Funding Reform Act by Fiscal Year 2025.”
The school district posted an information sheet on its website Thursday outlining a timeline where Cherry Hill would be fully funded by the 2024–25 school year. The timeline has Cherry Hill’s aid at $20.7 million in 2020–21, $22.6 million in 2021–22, $24.7 million in 2022–23, $26.9 million in 2023–24 and finally $29.3 million in 2024–25.
While Lang noted the district should have a small increase in state aid this year, she expressed concern at the district coming up short in revenues to fund infrastructure and facility improvements in the schools. After the district’s bond referendum failed to pass in December, Lang noted there are critical projects in the district costing tens of millions of dollars needing to be done. An increase in state aid would not be able to cover these expenses.
Moving forward, the Fair Funding group plans to work at finding new sources of revenue to help fund facility improvements in the district. Lang said Lampitt and Greenwald promised to help the district on this matter.
“They were very helpful in terms of looking at other options in terms of funding,” she said. “They didn’t promise us anything, but they said we’ll keep discussing and we’ll look at things for you.”
In a statement emailed to The Sun Wednesday, Assistant Superintendent Justin Smith echoed what Lang said about the importance of finding alternative funding resources to fund facility improvements.
“As our buildings’ critical needs grow — and will continue to grow — we will be working with our representatives to secure possible alternative funding resources in the coming months,” Smith said in the statement. “We appreciate their efforts and will be holding them accountable to make sure the funding plan they have devised for us comes to full fruition. We look forward to continued, increased community involvement in the fair funding effort.”
Details on the preliminary 2019–20 school budget were expected to be presented and discussed at the Cherry Hill Board of Education work session on Tuesday, March 19.
The Fair Funding group is continuing to work closely with school administration and the Cherry Hill BOE. In February, the board recently agreed to appoint member Jane Scarpellino as a representative who will attend the Fair Funding meetings. Lang added the group is planning to team up with the administration and board of education to create a video on fair funding to help educate the community. Board President Eric Goodwin and Superintendent Joe Meloche also sent out a letter about the Fair Funding effort on Feb. 27, detailing all of the meetings administration, board members, the Fair Funding group and township officials have had regarding the state aid issue.
The Fair Funding group is hoping to get more people involved in the movement. Lang encourages residents to come to the group’s monthly meetings. All of the meetings are open to the public.
“The best way is to get involved with the PTA, because the PTA presidents are always talking about it, and come to the meetings,” Lang said.
The next meeting of Fair Funding for Cherry Hill Public Schools will take place on Thursday, March 28, at 7 p.m. at the Malberg Administration Building.
