Thursday, October 21, 2010

A Question about Consolidation/GR Press Article

This past summer, the Grand Rapids Press had a 10.0 article about consolidating school districts in the State of Michigan. In the article, the reporter highlighted that there are 550 school districts in the state and that there is some duplication of services. Since consolidating services has been on the agenda of the Legislative Committee since before this article was written, we revisited the issue with the administration since the beginning of this school year. What we found was that this school district is collaborating with both the KISD and other districts on a number of services which are saving money and preventing cuts. We are contracting with GRPS for food services. We are sharing a school psychologist with Forest Hills. We have adopted the KISD business software to increase efficiency. We also collaborate with KISD on special education, OT and transportation services. Will you be backing collaboration like these examples or consolidation? Do you back fundamental tax structure changes that would be required to make consolidation work?