Greenburgh Seeks More School Funding from the State

Officials of Greenburgh Central School District -- making a new push following Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s new bailout program for distressed districts -- is calling on parents and residents to demand more funding for their schools.

Earlier in the spring, the district launched an advocacy webpage which instructed people to send emails to the governor requesting more equity in how state money is allocated to districts.

Roughly 1,000 people sent emails with the following:

For years, the Greenburgh Central School district has received less education aid than it is entitled to due to the inclusion of wealthier properties from an adjacent school district in the calculation of its wealth index. Approximately 50% of our students receive free or reduced price lunch, yet we receive less education aid than many neighboring districts with much higher property values and negligible amounts of students receiving free or subsidized lunch.

• RELATED: Gov. Cuomo Comes to the Rescue of NY’s Distressed Schools

School Superintendent Dr. Tahira Chase intends to lobby the state to plead the district’s case, and now Greenburgh Town Supervisor Paul Feiner is joining the fray.

“The students of Greenburgh and the community deserve what is rightfully theirs,” Feiner wrote this week in an email to parents and residents. “I will be joining Greenburgh Superintendent of Schools Dr. Chase and others in pressing NYS to correct the errors and to provide the school district with the funding that is deserved.”

On Sunday, Cuomo unveiled a $100 funding program to help distressed districts, including Yonkers, which is facing a multi-million dollar budget shortfall that jeopardized the jobs of hundreds of administrators and teachers.