By Walter Elliott
NEWARK – Registered voters here and in Irvington have the opportunity now through 8 p.m. April 25 to choose seven of 12 candidates to fill their respective boards of education.
The same voters have the rare right and honor to approve or disprove over $1.4 billion in 2023-24 school budget spending. Voters in nine other “Local Talk” towns have to wait until Nov. 7 to choose their board members – and do not have a say on their budgets.
The annual question, however, is how many Newark and Irvington voters will exercise their right in 2023’s first election.
Between 6,000 and 8,000 Newarkers and Irvingtonians sent Vote By Mail Ballots or stopped at polling stations this time in 2022, 21 and 19. (Turnout data from the May 12, 2020 combined school board and municipal election, prompted by the COVID-19 pandemic, are excluded).
The voters those three years came from a combined city and township pool of 210,000 to 180,000 registrants. The turnout comes out to a 2.9 to 4.3 percent participation range.
Boards of Education Races
In NEWARK, a line of politically-backed candidates are pitted against a challenging slate and two independent candidates to fill three Newark Public Schools Board of Education seats.
By “politically backed” in an ostensibly non-partisan election, the candidates are more than endorsed by one or more elected officials at the municipal, county, state and/or federal levels.
The said candidates may well have access to a political party’s get-out-the-vote personnel and resources. This is allowed by state law – so long as the candidates do not identify themselves as the “Democratic,” “Republican,” or whatever political party candidates.
Those opposing the said well-resourced slate have to gather their own finances and build their own GOTV personnel. The last time city voters “split tickets” – elected voters from two different slates – was in 2016.
Former board president Josephine Garcia, board member Hasani Council and new teammate Allison James-Frison are running on the “Moving Newark Schools Forward” ticket.
Voters first elected Garcia in 2017. The legislative aide for Newark Councilman Carlos Gonzalez was re-elected with then-first-timers Council and Flohisha Johnson in 2020.
Council, the son of South Ward Councilman Rev. Patrick Council, was legislative aide for former councilman John Sharpe James.
James-Frison, who ran as a challenger last year, was brought up after Johnson declined re-election. She is the founder of Girls: Live, Laugh, Love.
Moving Newark School Forward started out as a fusion ticket from the former annual rivals “Children First” and “For Our Kids” slates. MNSF first fielded candidates in 2017 Mayor Ras Baraka saw to creating the fusion ticket as part of preparing Newark Public Schools and its BOE for full autonomy from direct N.J. Department of Education control. (State control of NPS, after 25 years, officially ended in 2020.)
“Newark Kids Forward” had emerged this season with three candidates: Thomas Luna, Tawana Johnson-Emory and James Wright, Jr.
Luna may be the most familiar of the Newark Kids Forward trio. The eighth grade charter school math teacher finished fourth from a field of seven last year.
Johnson-Emory is making her first run. The New York City transit worker and TWU Local 100 member has been an eight-year president of North Star Academy’s Parent Council.
Wright is also waging his first campaign. The Newark native is an AP Environmental Science teacher and curriculum writer at North Star’s Washington Park High School.
LaToya Jackson and Ade’Kamil Kelly are running as solo independents.
Jackson, who has run her namesake hairdressing salon since 2018 has been a children’s advocate since starting a school uniform and improved lunch program at the Miller Street (elementary) School in 1992.
Kelly is running under his own “We Deserve Better” banner. The licensed real estate agent is a legislative aide for State Assemblywoman Shanique Speight.
In IRVINGTON, voters are being asked to return three incumbent board members and help fill a fourth.
Jordan Geffrard is seeking his first elected office victory by running to complete Gene Etchison’s unexpired term. The Irvington Board of Education appointed Geffrard last year after Etchison’s resignation.
Geffrard is running on the same platform with Board President Audrey M. Lyon and members Syesha Benbow and John F. Brown.
Lyon, a City of Hoboken employee, is seeking her fourth straight term. A majority of participating voters first elected her in 2014 and re-elected her in 2017 and 20.
Benbow is seeking her second term. The Irvington Township keyboard clerk ran with Lyon and Etchison in 2020.
John F. Brown is seeking his first full elected three year term. Irvington’s Deputy Public Safety Director was first elected to complete longtime member Richard Williams’ unexpired term last year.
The foursome on April 25’s ballot would normally fly the “Irvington Schools Strong” flag. ISS is a branch of former BOE President-turned-Mayor Anthony “Tony” Vauss’ nonpartisan municipal Team Irvington Strong.
This year’s Irvington Schools Strong campaign, except for a March 22 candidates forum by the NAACP-Irvington Branch, has been relatively quiet.
School Budgets
Newark voters are being asked to approve the $114 million property tax contribution of NPS’ proposed 2023-24 school year budget. That $114 million portion is nearly 10 percent of the overall $1.2 billion outlay.
About 86 percent of the spending plan, as approved by the BOE at its April 4 public hearing, comes from the State of New Jersey. Newark and 31 other public school districts have been receiving state aid since the 1990s to comply with the Supreme Court of New Jersey’s “Abbott vs. Burke” “thorough and efficient education” rulings.
The state has increased its proposed share by $114 million from the current or outgoing 2022-23 budget.
Part of that boost comes from the State Legislature changing its funding formula. That tweaking either keeps the state funding level the same as this year for the East Orange School District and increases for Newark, Irvington and the nine other “Local Talk” public school districts.
Part of the funding increase came from the state receiving more tax and fee revenue in 2022-23.
The plan, as proposed by Schools Superintendent Roger Leon and approved by the board, would channel the increase for:
- New Prekindergartens in several elementary schools.
- New Chromebooks for students.
- More transportation options.
- More funding for English Language Learners and Special Needs Students.
Leon and the Central Office are basing their budget in part on a projected 47,737 Kindergarten-12 Grade student enrollment among its 62 schools That figure remains unchanged from its Oct. 15, 2022 actual count.
It is also to the understanding of “Local Talk” that the proportion of NPS’s paying per student tuition to the charter schools remains unchanged at about 25 percent of the public district’s expenditures.
Former or prospective NPS students who enroll at a receiving charter school, by state law, are to pay those charter schools 90 percent of a per student tuition. Should a student return to an NPS school after Oct. 15, the formerly receiving charter school gets to keep that 90 percent tuition.
What voters are being asked is to say “Yea” or “Nay” on a proposed municipal school property tax levy of $138,314,942. That $138 million outlay has been the same for the third straight year.
IRVINGTON PUBLIC SCHOOLS’ proposed $233,168,277 2023-24 Budget. as approved by its BOE after a March 29 public hearing, includes a $17,459,529 property tax levy.
The $233,168,277, on one hand, is actually a decrease from this school year’s revised $258,911,168 budget. The 2021-22 outlay was $179,493,268.
The property tax levy, for the third straight school year, remains at $17,459,529.
The state, through its recalculated aid formula and increased revenue, has increased its funding from $20,601,476 for 2022-23 to the proposed $23,982,671.
IPS’ proposed funds transfer to receiving charter schools has gone up for the third straight year. The proposed budget allocates $24,942,919 to the charters against the $18,780,397 sent in 2022-23.
The calculations were based on $20,335 per student tuition. It is a drop from 2022-23’s $24,617 rate.
Should Irvington and/or Newark voters reject their respective proposed budgets, its mayors and councils are to create a Board of School Estimate.
The BSE, after consultation with municipal educators, would have a month to create a reduced budget to be passed by their respective councils. The BSE-made budget then goes to the Essex County Superintendent of Schools and ultimately the State House in Trenton for state budget inclusion.
State Legislators have until June 30 to pass a balanced state budget for Gov. Phil Murphy’s signature.
Voters are to either use a Vote By Mail Ballot for box dropping or postal mailing, or visit a polling station, now through 8 p.m. Check essexclerk.com or your municipal and/or school district clerk for polling booth location and other details.
