Daniel Hooberman: Rossi’s letter about school costs omits useful information

To The Daily Sun,

Paul Rossi’s letter to the editor regarding Laconia school costs omits some important information.

In his comparison to Utah’s costs, he does not account for the pension costs which Laconia has had to completely fund. In 2011, the State of New Hampshire stopped funding a share of the pension contributions for local teachers. Utah’s education pension cost is totally covered by the state.

Special education costs were also not included in his calculations. Laconia has 22-24% special needs students. Utah’s population includes 12.9% special needs students. Special needs students add significant expenses to school budgets. Laconia has 35% economically disadvantaged students versus 28% in Utah which adds to costs.

In addition, health insurance premiums in New Hampshire are about 33% higher than in Utah due to Utah’s much larger younger population being less costly to insure.

Finally, Utah’s school districts are much larger and benefit from costs at scale. Our student population is shrinking due to education vouchers incentivizing students to leave public education and the high cost of housing in Laconia.

Downshifting of costs by the state onto cities and towns are responsible for the enormous increases in property taxes, not excessive spending by school boards. New Hampshire ranks last in the country for the percentage of public school funding provided by the state government.

Educating our children is critical to our society and we must have accurate informed discussions that are not motivated by partisan campaigns.

Daniel Hooberman

Laconia