A new state law that allows school districts to bypass voter approval to spend money on large-scale capital improvement projects via referendums will soon be used in Passaic County.
The law allows districts to borrow funds through their county improvement authorities without posing a referendum question to the voters, as has been the case in the past. The concept is still relatively new, and though it is uncertain how many school districts plan to use it, Little Falls school officials say they are the first in Passaic County who will do so after two failed votes in referendums.
Little Falls school officials had prepared to go to the voters for a third time for approval of a $36 million proposal on Sept. 16, but pulled it back last month after learning they could forgo it and instead seek financing through the Passaic County Improvement Authority.
The authority is a governmental body established in 2002 to help finance public projects, including infrastructure, housing developments and schools.
Marc Pfeiffer, senior policy fellow at Rutgers University’s Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy, said the law change addresses a need. He said it allows the state, which is responsible for providing a thorough and efficient education, to act.
School districts that face a real need to upgrade facilities due to increased enrollments, state mandates, etc., have often been unable to do so, as voters reject referendum proposals year after year.
That was the case in Little Falls, where voters rejected the district’s referendum measure in 2021 and again in 2022.
Pfeiffer said voters go to the polls and reject measures for a number of reasons, depending on other conditions. They may be voting no because they don’t like the way their municipality is run, or because of economic conditions or other factors, without regard to what is going on with its schools and their needs, he said.
“It’s an attempt to balance competing interests,” Pfeiffer said. “Times change. People change. Laws change.” Still, he said, he is not surprised that public officials don’t want to comment on the record. Property taxes are extremely unpopular.