School districts defend taking their battle to court

Under the Monroe County's FAIR Plan, West Irondequoit Schools Superintendent Jeff Crane says school district will lose millions. “This is going to cost our school districts 29 million dollars in the next calendar year, 290 million dollars over ten years,” said Crane.

On Wednesday Crane joined other Monroe County School District officials in announcing their lawsuit against the Monroe County Executive Maggie Brooks and the County legislature. They’re asking a judge to make the county honor its current tax sharing agreement. School officials say under Brooks FAIR plan they stand to loose 50 percent of tax revenues. Officials say the cut could impact districts this school year.

“The more critical issue at the moment is were going to loose 600-thousand dollars from January one to June 30th this year,” said West Irondequoit Schools Assistant Superintendent William Domm.

School officials say part of the problem is they were not informed about the plan. “The school districts were not included in any discussion during the formative stages of this county plan and they were not given an opportunity to react to the specifics of the proposal,” said Monroe County School Board Executive Director Jody Siegle.

But Republican county lawmaker Bill Smith says schools were informed. The school district were aware that the Medicaid swap was an option for at least a year and a half. In fact, some of the school districts made adjustments to their budgets in anticipation of something being done. So, the idea that this came out of the blue the last minute is really a bit over the top,” said Smith. Now it will be up to the courts to decide who's right and who's wrong. So far a court date has not been set.