School districts across New Jersey are facing budget deficits in the millions. A new hearing at the Statehouse put the crisis front and center — but solutions are still hard to come by.
On Thursday, New Jersey Assembly lawmakers held a public hearing to dig into a problem that’s been building for a while now. School districts across the state are bleeding money. We’re not talking about small shortfalls, either. Districts from Hackensack to Toms River are dealing with deficits ranging from $5 million to $100 million.
This, even with such a large portion of our property taxes being allocated for schools.
That’s real money with real consequences. Teachers have been laid off. School nurses are gone. Programs have been cut. In one case shared during the hearing, a student having an asthma attack went to the nurse’s office — only to find it empty and locked.
What Happened at the Hearing
The Assembly’s education committee heard about 90 minutes of testimony from educators, union leaders, auditors, and school business officials. The witnesses didn’t agree on everything, but they landed on one core issue: the state isn’t providing enough funding.
New Jersey’s current budget includes roughly $12 billion in formula aid for schools. That’s about 3% more than the previous year. But according to those who testified, it’s nowhere near enough to keep up with rising costs.
Deborah Cornavaca of the New Jersey Education Association made a direct plea to lawmakers, saying districts are constantly shuffling money between accounts just to meet their obligations. She urged legislators to increase funding, calling the current situation unsustainable.
The Blame Game Gets Complicated
Here’s where things got messy.
Some witnesses pointed to mismanagement at the local level. Teachers union leaders from Perth Amboy told lawmakers that district leadership has blamed past administrations for a $13 million deficit — even though the current superintendent has been in the role since 2015. Josiah Santamaria, an eighth-grade teacher and American Federation of Teachers representative, said flatly that poor leadership is putting children at risk.
Assemblyman Erik Simonsen took a hard line on accountability, arguing that leaders who can’t balance a budget simply shouldn’t hold those jobs.
But Susan Young of the New Jersey Association of School Business Officials pushed back on that narrative. She argued that the real problem isn’t incompetence — it’s a mismatch between what districts are required to spend and the resources they’re actually given. She warned that the pressure is driving people out of the profession entirely, saying the state has reached “a crisis.”
What Fixes Were Proposed?
Assemblywoman Verlina Reynolds-Jackson, the committee’s chair, asked witnesses to bring solutions to the table. A few ideas came up:
- Increase the surplus cap. Right now, districts can only set aside 2% in surplus funds. Cornavaca urged lawmakers to raise that to 4%, giving districts a bigger financial cushion.
- Align budget timelines. Schools finalize their budgets months before the state passes its own. That means districts are building plans around estimated numbers that can change significantly. Cornavaca called this “a recipe for errors.”
- Control health care costs. Rising premiums for public school employees were flagged as a major and growing expense.
- Fix accounting and oversight gaps. State auditor David J. Kaschak noted that eight financially struggling districts he audited over five years shared common problems, including errors in accounting and state aid applications.
This issue has parents, educators, and taxpayers talking. The general mood? Frustration from every angle. Teachers feel under-resourced. Administrators feel blamed for problems they didn’t create. And parents are watching their kids lose access to basic services like speech therapy and school nurses.
The tension between “fund us more” and “manage what you have better” isn’t new. But the scale of these deficits is making the conversation more urgent than it’s been in years.
The Bottom Line
New Jersey’s school budget crisis isn’t a single problem with a single fix. It’s a tangle of inadequate state funding, rising costs, misaligned timelines, and — in some cases — leadership failures. The hearing made one thing clear: the status quo isn’t working for anyone.
What do you think? Should the state step up with more funding, or do local districts need to clean house first? Maybe it’s both. Drop your thoughts in the comments — this is a conversation that affects every student, parent, and taxpayer in the state.
