I attended a public budget hearing meeting for the Newark Public Schools (NPS) held on August 20 th, 2019, at 8.30 A.M. The institution held the meeting at its auditorium in New Jersey. The session for the fiscal year 2019 budget hearing started with presentations from the NPS, where it discussed budget priorities. In the second part of the session, the board members offered their feedback on the budgetary plans provided by the school, followed by public testimony. The dialogue continued later, where NPS responded to questions from the public testimony. The meeting concluded later in the day with a resolution vote.
The first aspect of the meeting that impressed me was availing the auditorium planned for guests before 7:00 AM. After the arrival of all guests, I thought that the master of the ceremony would go straight into business, but he decided first to acknowledge the public and all the guests. I think that beginning the meeting with accolades helped attract the attention of the public towards the main event; the budget. There were many people in attendance, including family and friends of students, which showed the best and positive aspect of the school district.
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During the opening highlights, I was impressed with the amount of personal information the board members had about the daily operations of the school. Once the board members had finished outlining the school’s budgetary requirements, I was disappointed with the way the rest of the meeting progressed. The crowd became disorganized, and the noise level in the room was untenable. Everyone wanted to talk, and while one speaker was presenting his ideas, the other would rise without permission towards the podium to make comments without authorization from the master of ceremony.
I understood that people were there primarily for the budget hearing part, but I did not expect such disorganization. However, I remember the speech of one woman who clearly articulated issues regarding budgets for school awards for students and legal aspects. Looking around the audience, it was clear she had lost most people; the general mood of the room seemed confused and somewhat disinterested. The rest of the public comment session ended the same way, with the speaker after speaking facing a hard time airing his or her opinion.
The last piece of the meeting presented the most significant challenge to the organizers. The school still managed to tally the vote, and the last item remaining was for the board to present the final resolutions to the public. I was impressed by the communication style of the chairperson, who presented the final deliberations to the rowdy public without any significant incidents. He communicated with a commanding but an emotional tone that made everyone in the meeting realize that the real purpose of the budget hearing process was to ensure the students did not face any obstacles in their quest for education.
Overall, I left the meeting, feeling that I had gained a lot from my involvement in this activity. Although lengthy and disorganized, sometimes, it was informative. It was captivating to observe how the meeting progressed and how the NPS managed to combine all aspects of the program to come up with the best outcome. The last thing that I noted with concern was the number of people who left after the vote, a sign that they were disappointed with the general direction the meeting had taken after the voting process.
