By Josh Resnek
City hall has announced that the School Finance Task Force will be issuing its report and findings at a joint committee of the School Committee and City Council on September 4 at city hall.
The report is expected to generate possible policy and spending changes.
However, none of the Task Force findings and or suggestions are binding.
The Task Force has apparently used the past 18 months to scrutinize closely all aspects of school spending policy in order to come up with recommendations to save money.
The Task Force membership includes Samuel Tyler, former president of the Boston Municipal Research Bureau; Dr. Dwayne Thomas, of Thomas Leadership Solutions; Jon Fullerton, Executive Director of the Center for Education Policy Research at Harvard University; and Barry Sloane, President and CEO of Century Bank.
To date, not a sliver of what will be reported on September 4 has been released to the public or even to officials of the School Department and the School Committee.
The mayor created the Task Force during a time of considerable financial need for the School Department which forced the administration to hand over millions in order to make up for more than $6.5 million in needed funding that was not part of the original yearly budget.
The Everett Public Schools have lived in an underfunded fashion for many, many years.
This year’s budget is also underfunded but the administration has provided sufficient funding to make emergency appropriations unnecessary.
In addition, the city’s cash position has been turned upside down in a positive way with the opening of the Encore Boston Harbor Casino and Hotel.
Just the same, the Task Force is expected to comment specifically on school spending with an eye toward eliminating waste, if in fact there is waste, as well as proposing new tactics and spending measures to stretch out Everett’s funding base.