ALBANY – It has been nine years since the state’s 2007 Foundation Aid Formula was implemented with eight city school districts filing suit maintaining they have lost millions in state aid to which they were entitled.
Those districts include Kingston, Newburgh, Port Jervis, Poughkeepsie, Mount Vernon, Jamestown, Niagara Falls and Utica.
Poughkeepsie School Board President Ralph Coates was in Albany Monday meeting with lawmakers and officials of other districts calling for an immediate resolution to a lawsuit they filed seeking the back funding from the state.
“Poughkeepsie alone has been underfunded millions and millions of dollars each year and because of the underfunding that we have been receiving it affects our overall budget and ultimately every year we have been cutting and reducing in teachers, in support staff and also a number of programs as well over the years,” Coates said.
State Senator Susan Serino (R, Hyde Park), who joined in the Albany rally calling for equitable school aid, called it “terrible; not fair to our kids.”
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