As you sit and listen to school board discussions about Hamilton County Schools’ budget, it’s tough to have a discussion that does not look back more than it looks forward. My colleagues and I have tried in five budget meetings over the past 30 days, but honestly, we have rarely succeeded. Too much of the past gets caught up in the discussion of the future, and that just is not healthy. A reasoned sense of how our county education system got to where it is over the past dozen or so years is a good thing, and I am still learning. Dwelling on it is counterproductive.
Tuesday night, the 18 elected members of the Board of Education and the Hamilton County Commission met for nearly two hours. Together, along with four members of the school system’s staff and County Mayor Jim Coppinger, the 19th publicly elected official, we talked about the budget challenges facing both bodies, the superintendent search, fixing roofs, $216 million on a capital needs list, school zoning issues, Chattanooga School for Liberal Arts, the budget process, high school athletic facilities, status of county bond money, property tax increases and other revenue sources.
It was a full plate of topics. I think the next superintendent would have been pleased to hear the overall discussion, even if he or she knew a little bit of our school system’s history over the past two decades. Nothing was solved at the meeting, but there were some very good action items discussed that need to be organized. There were times of excellent discussion, times of frank disagreement and times when it was clear that neither body had all the accurate information it needed.
Still, like in the school board’s Finance Committee, I had a sense that too often the discussion resided in past actions, past statistics, past lists, past tax increases and past perceptions that may not be true today.
Think about any discussion today around the subject of new money for schools. What seems clear is that county commissioners today do not see the way forward to raise property taxes. Some said as much Tuesday night. That is their decision and I respect it. However, here is an example of where the past helps the school board because the 12-year track record of no increase in county revenue – beyond natural growth in property tax revenue – establishes the environment in which board members discuss their budget going forward in the next few weeks.