News from Lakewood and beyond
Over 100 people packed the Lakewood School Board meeting last Wednesday, held in the spacious Lakewood High School auditorium to accommodate what was expected to be a large, irate crowd.
Parents and teachers were in attendance, concerned over the closure and sale of school buildings and the $39 million hole in BOE finances. Teachers wanted to be sure they would be paid and not laid off; parents wanted to know that their kids’ services would not be slashed.
Welcome to the latest iteration of a long-running crisis. The Lakewood Board of Education, which runs the public schools within the township, is facing a severe funding shortfall — $39 million on an overall budget of $260 million, or about 15 percent. The district’s current cash reserves will run out in mid-May — before the end of the fiscal year, on June 30 — by which time board members hope the state will approve loans for the missing money. If it doesn’t, Lakewood’s public school services, including transportation and special education funding used heavily by the frum community, will shut down.
We’re not overly concerned,” BOE business administrator Kevin Campell tells Mishpacha. “This is kind of how the state of New Jersey does business with us. They know we legitimately need the money, and release it to us in the form of loans, kind of in dribs and drabs.”
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