Seven Lakewood residents have filed paperwork with the Ocean County Clerk seeking election to the Lakewood Township Board of Education in November.
There are three seats up for re-election and all incumbents have filed as well, including Ada Gonzalez, Eliyahu Greenwald, and Moshe Raitzik.
Of the remaining four candidates, three are running under the slogan “Fixing the Formula.” They are Yo[n]i Morgenstern, A[v]rohom Schubert, and Eli Eisenbach.
The seventh candidate who filed, Yehuda Shain, registered with the slogan “Accountability and Transparency.”
All seats are for three year terms.
In neighboring Manchester, nine people have filed for three seats, including Samuel Schiff, Chaim Tarkieltaub and Joseph Friedman, who filed with the slogan “Education for All.”
The BOE has encumbered us with $250 million in debt, of which, we are paying back 10% a year. It will be a billion within five years. The State has been saying for years that we have the lowest tax rate of any NJ urban area. There is a good change the legislature will remove the 2% tax increase cap and impose a payroll tax by then as it has in other urban areas because of the debt. All this money is coming out of the annual state budget and they want to shift it to Lakewood taxpayers. The BOE needs to support the ongoing litigation to fix the formula to force the state to pay its fair share and forgive the debt.
There is a good chance by then (five years from now) the legislature will remove the 2% tax increase cap and authorize a payroll tax. It has already removed the cap and authorized a payroll tax in other urban areas. The only difference is, in Lakewood, the state monitors, who must remain in Lakewood until all the debt is paid back, will force a geometric tax upon us against our will once the legislature authorizes it.
It doesn’t matter who is running for the Lakewood board of education. They are not really doing much for the public school system anyway. The system is so messed up. The people who are running don’t have any of their kids in public schools. But , placing themselves in a position to dictate how the school system should be run. What a joke.
Not sure if you are an Orthodox resident but thanks for your awareness on this issue. Please do not forget that with hundreds of private schools that need to be built in Jackson (and other future towns?) and the tens of thousands of school age kids that need busing, what about public school funding for all towns experiencing growth of Orthodox (Howell, Manchester, Jackson, TR, Brick and beyond)? Are the Orthodox ok with those school systems possibly going under too like Lakewood and there will hundreds million if not billions of dollars of loans that need to be taken out for them too? The Orthodox leadership does not seem to have interest in how the growth of your community will impact the outside world. I know you guys want to live in your insular world, but we still share common resources that Hashem has created (environment, roads, schools).
There are two possibilities how the matter will be resolved. 1) The governor settles with the student plaintiffs by throwing money at Lakewood, a so-called carve-out, or 2) a term will be added to the formula to count all the kids. Option 1 would serve only Lakewood. Option, the preferred outcome, will help every district with large numbers of nonpublic students and become a model for every other state in the nation. The ball is in the governor’s court now as the Appellate Division has not given his commissioner a timetable and it seems that he wants to drag his feet until his term expires. That is not going to happen.
The formula MUST be fixed!
Imo, I feel you should be a resident of the town and have children in the public school system to run for a spot. If you have your own children involved, you are more apt to fight for whats right!