A classic “town vs. gown” fight erupted at the monthly board meeting of the Dutchess County Legislature on Monday, July 14, as a resolution that would have added $531,000 to the budget of Dutchess Community College in order to enable the school to avoid a planned $100 annual increase in the tuition for full-time students was defeated in a tie vote.
In a furious battle worthy of Bastille Day, opposing legislators lined up to champion what they depicted as either the right of taxpayers to relief or of students to have a low-cost education.
“As a member of the Board of Trustees of Dutchess Community College, I am proud to serve such a fiscally responsible institution,” said Legislator David Kelly (R-Pawling). “Yet we are in a fiscally unstable, fiscally uncertain time. We keep hearing doom and gloom. I think doom and gloom is what the taxpayers have to pay. We are not doing justice by our taxpayers by passing this budget.”
“I cannot, in good conscience, pass another tuition increase on to the students of Dutchess Community College,” countered Margaret Fettes (D–Amenia/Pleasant Valley/Stanford/Washington). “They are our lifeblood and our future.”
Tuition for fulltime students is currently $2,800 per year.
DCC President Dr. David Conklin was on hand to place the issue in perspective, citing how the college’s fiscal responsibility was shown in many ways, such as not hiring new full-time faculty and keeping maintenance costs down, in a manner which benefited both “town” and “gown.”
“I think we can demonstrate over time that we have done this,” Conklin said in reference to maintaining fiscal conservatism. “Our costs per student are substantially lower than other community colleges.”
He was backed up by Majority Leader Sandra Goldberg (D-Wappinger), who stressed that the burden on the town is already low.
“In the Hudson Valley community colleges, we had contributed the lowest percentages to our community college than any surrounding counties,” Goldberg said.
But the “townies” were having none of it.
“County taxpayers will not appreciate it when they get their tax bill,” said Angela Flesland (R-Town of Poughkeepsie).
“There has to be a balancing act of what we charge our students and what we charge our taxpayers,” said Assistant Minority Leader Rob Rolison (R-City of Poughkeepsie). His vote and that of 11 of his colleagues, including Democrats Diane Nash (D-Hyde Park) and Richard Keller-Coffey (D-Town of Poughkeepsie), showed that they believed that the resolution did not strike this balance, even though it had been pared down from an initial figure of $700,000 to defray the student’s costs.
The Legislature now has until Sept. 1 to approve a budget for the 2008-2009 school year. If it fails to come to an agreement, the chancellor of the New York State Board of Regents would have to be called in to try and broker a deal.
In other business, a resolution authorizing the issuance of $9,991,627 in serial bonds to pay the costs of various improvements to county parks was passed unanimously, as were several other supporting resolutions that cleared the way for new parks in terms of eminent domain and the creation of a county rail trail. But not before misgivings were expressed.
“It is the strong belief of myself and others that in these difficult economic times with revenue streams drying up, it is not the time to start the development of a new park,” said Goldberg. But a strong plea from Flesland carried all objections before it.
“Having better parks at the time of the Hudson Quadricentennial will bring in tourist dollars,” she said. “I really urge everyone to reconsider this. Delaying this is not good for Dutchess County.”