The New York State Senate has passed the "Taxpayer Empowerment and Accountability (TEA) Plan," a comprehensive reform package designed to help lower school costs. The senate plan will eliminate waste, increase transparency of school district expenses, and reduce costs so historic state aid is driven into the classroom where it can help students the most.

Taxpayers need and deserve relief, and this is a good place to start.

As part of its overall plan, the senate has passed legislation to restrict "golden parachutes," a contractual agreement between a school district and an employee specifying that the employee will receive certain significant benefits if he or she is terminated.

The senate has approved legislation (S.8530) to prohibit lawyers from being listed as employees of school districts for the sole purpose of earning additional pension and health benefits that drive up costs for taxpayers, and increase civil and criminal penalties for pension fraud.

In addition, a measure (S.6996A) to protect local school property taxpayers by prohibiting "double-dipping" by independent contractors receiving payment as both school district employees and independent contractors has passed the senate. The legislation addresses a recent series of incidents on Long Island where attorneys who were employed by both school districts and private law firms received duplicate payment for their services and became eligible for public pension and health care benefits.

Parents have a right to expect that every possible penny of their school taxes is spent in the classroom. The legislation will prevent future abuses of the system and help boost taxpayers’ trust in our local school districts.

Rising school taxes remain the single-biggest burden facing homeowners across the state and threaten the well-being of our hardworking families. The senate has consistently fought to increase state funding to our schools to help provide tax relief and provide the quality education our students need.

Parents, taxpayers, and others deserve to have as much detail about their school district as possible. To that end, the senate has passed legislation (S.607A) to require that each school district include the percentage of its budget spent on instructional expenses in its school district report card.

Meanwhile, to provide additional transparency, the package of bills includes legislation (S.5830B) to require school districts to make their budgets and an itemized summary of expenditures and revenue available in printed form and on the Internet. The bill requires timely reporting and addresses a growing public concern regarding accountability in the wake of recent scandals involving school district finances. By making budgetary information available for scrutiny, this bill aims to help restore the confidence of the public in fiscal management of our school systems.

The senate also approved comprehensive mandate relief measures (S.8519) in order to help reduce costs to school districts, municipalities and local taxpayers, including:

> A ban on unfunded mandates to prevent the legislature from imposing a mandate on localities or school districts which cost over $1 million combined statewide;

> A one-year delay on any agency regulations with fiscal implications to protect school districts from incurring costs of regulations adopted after school budgets are voted on;

> "The Paperwork Reduction Act" to eliminate a number of reports currently required by statute but are no longer relevant or serve a public purpose, enabling school districts to save additional money.

In addition, legislation to encourage school consolidation and shared services (S.8531) passed the senate The provisions include:

> Enhanced consolidation incentives that allow a permanent operating incentive for school districts that merge’

> Superintendent sharing to allow school boards to share a single superintendent across a maximum of three districts. Under the proposal, districts with enrollment of less than 1,000 students would be eligible, which includes 200 of the 682 school districts in New York State.

If the state places a mandate on schools, it should pay for it – it’s as simple as that.