It never ceased to amaze me how many conservatives praise "local control." In NJ and much of NY State, it means nothing but higher taxes and a dispersion of patronage from the core to the periphery.
My town and surrounding towns have their own fire department and EMS - volunteer. In some towns, EMS is so volunteer, we raise the money ourselves to buy the ambulances. Donations appreciated, esp. when we save your life.
Corzine wants to regionalize. Paid firefighters and EMS = more state employees, more generous benefits following early retirement = what’s killing us now.
Local school districts wouldn’t be so bad if they weren’t so top-heavy with administrators - superintendents gettting close to 200K - again with the generous pension plans. But I don’t see regionalizing as the only way to reduce administration - the Catholic schools do with a lot less.
At least local control allows for budgets to be voted down and it does happen. The school district where my children go is education-proud and built a brand-new fancy high school - now people there are starting to be very unhappy with their 13K property taxes (for a relatively modest McMansion) so I am guessing the next budget will get voted down.
My town doesn’t have its own schools, or McMansions. We pay to send our children to the larger town, and have lower property taxes because our population has been stable - not so many young families moving in. The folks in other states would still be shocked at our taxes, though.