Aid Payments Due to Schools May Bear Brunt of State Budget Crunch
With the state facing an $800 million shortfall in its fiscal 2014 budget, there are only so many places that the money can be found to close the gap — and state aid to schools is among the most obvious.
After all, state education aid makes up more than one-third of the overall budget, totaling more than $12.8 billion.
But in a sometimes testy hearing before the Assembly budget committee yesterday, acting Education Commissioner David Hespe offered few clues about whether the answer might simply be delaying school-aid payment until the next fiscal year or eliminating the aid payments outright — or something in between.
“At this point in time, I cannot say what the impact will be, although we can certainly assume given that school funding, both direct and indirect payments, makes up a third of the budget, we can certainly assume there will be some impact,” Hespe said in response to repeated questioning that opened the hearing.
“I just cannot say what that is,” he said. “The goal would be to limit impact to as little as possible. . . . At this point in time, everything is on the table, and I don’t have the ability to take anything off the table.”
State Assemblyman Gary Schaer (D-Passaic), chairman of the budget committee, prodded Hespe further, sometimes sounding like a lawyer in cross-examination.
“Forgive me, I don’t mean to put you on the spot, and I understand the governor will do what he believes what he needs to do to have the less disastrous effects,” Schaer said. (Mooney/NJSpotlight)
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