VIDEO: Middletown Vs. Board of Ed. This Time, Money

Whats the problem? Money. Money, and the desire for it, and fighting for whats yours. 

The disagreement is over grant money from the state. In a nutshell, as I see it, the city's transportation grant was reduced and was added to the Special Education Excess Cost Grant. 

The purpose of this grant is to balance the special education expenditures. The BOE requested the total amount of this grant to be giving to them and the City of Middletown used money from this grant to balance out its reduced transportation grant.

Questions I have are:

What have the trends been for the BOE's excess spending for the last 10 years?

I want to know how much extra the BOE has needed for special education every year and do they always need the total amount that provided by the state? 

A letter from the State of CT Board of Education states, "If insufficient local funds appropriated to meet such special education expenditures, the town must turn over the new state grant money to the local board of education or credit the amount to the appropriate board if education's expenditures account, i.e., the state grant funds must be used to support those additional costs."

So why did the city authorize use of such funds when the BOE requested the grant money in full?

We have two large institutions in Middletown. The city and the BOE, and both are given money to share from the state. 

It's kind of like giving two young siblings a $20 bill and trusting to share it nicely.

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