SMARTaxes Announces….
SMARTaxes, the Scarborough taxpayer advocacy group, is pleased to announce their first anniversary meeting scheduled for 6 pm, May 4, 2015 at The Rock Church, 66 Gorham Road, Scarborough. The meeting is open to all. We will review the past year, address our concerns for the proposed municipal and school budgets, and listen to all who want to address the public group.
Mike Turek, one of the group’s co-founders, said “We want to re-affirm our commitment to our charter, hear public concerns, and listen to ideas for keeping Scarborough taxes from further dramatic escalation. Bring your concerns and ideas.”
About SMARTaxes:
SMARTaxes was formed in March, 2014 by a group of Scarborough residents concerned with the escalating tax spend. Our mission statement appears below:
To provide and widely share information and analyses of Town and School finances and to advocate for tax rates that support excellent public education, provide quality public services and are affordable for all Scarborough residents.
ScarboroughTaxes.com 
As a retiree on fixed income we have seen our taxes go up every year which is nice for the town but not to those of us who have not received an increase in our pensions. Look at it another way, how long as it been since we have had no children in school in town nor grandchildren either. Sure I know we all get hit in our tax bills for the schools. They eat up over 60% of the town budget and they have the gall to request a huge increase in taxes again this year.! Is the town fathers and mothers rich, how about the school folks. I don’t think so thus I am having a hard time understanding how they continue to hit us in the wallet every single year! I have a question, does it take more and more money to get the best education. You know how governments are, if things are not working throw more money at it with the hopes things get better. How is that working out? Personally how the taxpayers in town sit back and get hit by more and more taxes is beyond me. That’s what I am thinking.
Thank you for your comment. To try to answer your question, there are many studies that state varying degrees of correlation between school spending and student achievement, Links to two recent studies appear below:
http://washington.cbslocal.com/2014/04/07/study-no-link-between-school-spending-student-achievement/
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/connecting-school-spending-and-student-achievement/2014/07/09/cfc82cf6-06fd-11e4-bbf1-cc51275e7f8f_story.html
We advocate for a different approach to the way the school budget is developed in this town. Rather than a “this is what we want/need” approach, the School Board needs to look outside their myopic current perspective that ignores the average citizens affordability. Educating the taxpayers of Scarborough on the budget process and getting more people involved are two of our goals and challenges.
SMARTaxes
It is interesting to see the School Budget Committee meeting for 5/7/15 is NOT listed on the Town’s calendar. I was told today, 5/7/15, by a school dept staffer they only post school board meetings on the Town’s web site.
Second, on the school website on 5/7/15 @ 2:01PM, the following location is listed for the meeting.
Finance Committee Meeting
Thu, May 7, 5:30pm – 6:30pm
Scarborough Hall, Beaconsfield St, Scarborough, North Yorkshire YO12 4DP, UK (map)
Since the UK is 6hr ahead of us, this meeting already happened!