Englewood — Officials at the Englewood on the Palisades Charter school don’t have many kind words for the state budget that leaves their state aid flat.
"We got flat funding," said the school’s director/financial consultant Tony Brackett. "Everything goes up. We put in a call to protest but were told funding would remain flat."
The state is proposing to increase funding to charter schools by $51.8 million. Palisades Charter’s county neighbors, however, will receive an increase. Its neighbors, Bergen Arts & Science and Teaneck Community charter schools are looking at increases. If the state budget gets approved as is, Bergen Arts will receive an additional $951,536 and Teaneck Community would receive $95,093 more.
Besides the Englewood school, nine others charter schools are not likely to receive any additional funding in the state’s preliminary budget for Fiscal Year 2009, which starts July 1.
However, similar to public education funding, the state unveiled a new plan for charter school funding. The new plan attempts to help charter schools that have greater financial problems.
Charter schools are not funded the way public schools are. These schools rely mainly on student tuition and state aid. If state aid and tuition rates don’t match cost increases it could create financial problems for the future.
And it is that future Brackett is concerned about.
"It is not going to hurt us this year," he said. "But my concern is next year."
For now, Brackett has been told that the aid would remain flat following Fiscal Year 2009, which would be $2.8 million.
"We don’t have the option of raising taxes. Our budget is strictly by enrollment and we are bound by our charter," he said.
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A look at how some of the charter schools would fare based on the state aid formula.