Newtown Residents Release Budget Guide

Since the summer of 2011, five Newtown residents have been meeting with officials and combing through data. The result is "The Newtown Education Budget: A Citizen's Guide to the Budget Development Process."

The purpose of this 100-page document is to provide a resource for residents who are interested in learning more about the education budget, said organizer Kinga Walsh.

"The process is daunting," said Walsh, explaining that there isn't one place where residents can gather all the information they need to make informed decisions.

"We saw a hole and an opportunity to help Newtown residents understand the budget," said Walsh, who initiated the group last summer.

In addition to Walsh, the volunteer group includes Alisa Farley, Robin Fitzgerald, Chuck Hepp and Cathy Reiss, who are all Newtown residents with children in the public schools and have differing views on how to achieve quality education.

"We all saw the need for quality education and to get involved," said Hepp. "Kinga brought us together."

Hepp, an American Airlines pilot, said he wanted to create a reference not only for residents but for politicians so they can make informed decisions.

Hepp explained that for years he has attended town meetings and has heard parents with specific school issues but no one has wanted to get involved enough to find out why there are issues.

"I just want to bring data to the decisions," said Hepp.

And the report has pages and pages of data, with graphs and charts that were compiled from local and state sources to reflect Newtown's standings with regard to a variety of items. Many of the charts reflect Newtown's ranking within its DRG, or District Reference Group.

As the guide explains, Connecticut uses 9 DRGs to group its 169 districts by similarities in enrollment, parental education, hardship and other variables. So looking at data across Newtown's designated DRG hopefully gives a snapshot of how our schools are doing in relation to other like districts, said Farley, who compiled much of the data.

"I have a passion for finding information and disseminating it," said Farley, whose marketing and media research background helped with her research for the budget guide.

Regardless of if people support the budget or not, "I feel we are making something valuable and powerful in order to make the budget information accessible," said Farley.

"People are busy and may not be aware of all that's going on," said Reiss, who contributed to the report from her viewpoint as a former IBM employee and current stay-at-home mother.

As for distributing the document, Walsh read a letter during public participation at the Feb. 22 meeting (see attached) asking for time in the March 6 agenda to present the group's findings. The group would like the link to the budget guide to be distributed possibly through district emails and newsletters, with hard copies available in town offices. Group members are investigating if the link can be included on the PTA portion of the school websites, said Walsh.

Walsh noted that other Connecticut towns, such as Milford, Trumbull and Canton, already have similar documents available for their residents.

The five volunteers hope to update the guide annually.

To view the Newtown Education Budget Guide, click here or paste this link:

http://sites.google.com/site/newtownedbudgetguide/

Editor's note: An earlier version of this story said the group wanted the link on the school websites. In fact, the group is looking into the possibility of the link being only on the PTA portion of the school website.