ÌìÃÀÊÓƵ

In a gubernatorial debate hosted by the , Democrat Neil Abercrombie said educational Furlough Fridays could have been avoided all together.

How?

By more effective use of federal money dolled out to the states.

“I believe furlough Fridays were a function of the failure to understand that we could use those federal dollars in a creative way where education was concerned,” Abercrombie said. “So that we would have had a period to get through this recession and see to it that our children are educated.”

(Abercrombie’s comment begins at 6:50. Video of the debate is embedded below.)

Did Gov. Linda Lingle and Abercrombie’s Republican opponent, Lt. Gov. James “Duke” Aiona fail to take full advantage of federal funds to keep kids in the classroom?

It’s not black and white.

The problem is, is that it’s always easier to analyze the past.

In June 2009, Lingle drafted an , mandating every state employee be furloughed three days per month. But, since the governor does not have the authority to impose furloughs on the DOE, she instead opted to cut its budget.

The state Legislature, struggling along with a failing global economy and shrinking tax revenues, cut the Hawaii Department of Education‘s budget by $469 million for the 2009-2011 school years.

To meet the demands of budget cuts, the DOE shut down a school, reined in spending on supplies and announced schools would close for a total of 34 Fridays, spread out over two years.

Technically, the Lingle administration did not order a single day off for any of Hawaii’s public schools — that was the DOE’s decision. But, in reality, had she not enforced the budget cuts, the DOE wouldn’t have had to make the move in the first place.

A spokesman for Lingle, Russell Pang, said: “It’s important to note that the governor originally did not support furloughs. She first proposed graduated pay cuts for government employees as a way to address the budget shortfall while preserving state services. The unions did not agree to pay cuts and instead they proposed furloughs.”

Pang added, “The governor went along with furloughs for teachers, but asked the DOE/BOE/HSTA to minimize impact to students – including scheduling furlough days on non-instructional days. Unfortunately, the DOE/BOE/HSTA scheduled the furloughs on Fridays. She worked diligently to end furlough Fridays by asking teachers to return to the classroom and move furlough days to non-instructional days.”

It is also important to note that many public charter schools were able to avoid furloughs entirely because teachers worked with reduced pay.

“Unfortunately,” Pang said, “the teachers in the traditional schools were not allowed to return to their classrooms as a result of the agreement reached by the BOE and the HSTA.”

Regardless, Furlough Fridays sparked a firestorm of public criticism aimed at the DOE and Lingle for putting money ahead of education.

(Eventually, teachers agreed to take six of their furloughs scheduled for 2010 on planning days. In May, Lingle took $57.2 million from the state’s Hurricane Relief Fund to end the remaining 11 furlough days.)

Now that we have some history, the question remains whether could Lingle have used federal money to prevent Furlough Fridays?

Following the Money

According to a Oct. 23, 2009 Honolulu Advertiser penned by U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, the included $100 billion for education in the United States.

Of that, $40 billion was earmarked to help “states avoid devastating cuts in K-12 education,” Duncan wrote. “My department has already made $105 million available to Hawaii from this stabilization fund. Hawaii is eligible for $52 million more when we release the rest of those funds later this year.”

Hawaii’s share of federal stimulus for education has come primarily from the State Fiscal Stabilization Fund. To date, the Lingle administration was awarded about $192.2 million to be used at the governor’s discretion. The stimulus came in two chunks, $141.2 million in July, 2009, and $51 million in August 2010.

Of the stimulus, Lingle appropriated about $157 million for the DOE, the University of Hawaii and public charter schools for teacher salaries and to help prevent layoffs, said Linda Smith, Lingle’s senior policy advisor.

Smith testified at a hearing held Tuesday by the . The money covered salaries for about 2,000 public school teachers and 150 UH professors.

Of the remaining $35 million, Smith said, “Governors could use it on any state function; Hawaii chose to spend it on education.”

Lingle the $35 million on a series of education-based projects, such as $3.2 million for the Hawaii Excellence Through Science and Technology Academies; $2.8 million towards robotics; and $749,800 to support Science Technology Engineering and Math Center, or STEM.

Lingle said that she used the $35 million, focused on programs like STEM, to help position Hawaii to win another federal grant, Race to the Top.

The state ultimately did win $75 million and is still deciding how the money will be spent.

Keeping Kids in School

The big question, though, is could this money have been used for the sole of purpose of keeping children in the classroom?

For example, could Lingle have placed her $35 million on the bargaining table and said to the unions: “Look, I’ll put this $35 million back into the budget of the DOE, funding (hypothetically) six more days of education. In return, I need you to lighten your own budget so that you can keep teachers in the classroom for an 11 additional days, restoring all 17 Fridays?”

It’s quite hypothetical. But you get the idea.

Kate Stanley, the chair of the Federal Economic Stimulus Program Oversight Commission, wondered the same thing.

“Why didn’t we use the money to end furloughs?” Stanley asked Smith at the Tuesday hearing.

Smith replied: “Because we made a commitment to focus on STEM related programs, assisting with the charter schools, that brought in an additional $75 million in Race to the Top money.”

Stanley countered: “I’m not sure this $35 million has been used in the most wise way when it could have been used to reduce furlough days for over 176,000 school children. I’m quite concerned that this discretionary money was used in such a way that, while nice to have… it didn’t benefit the most students possible.”

Stanley told Civil Beat that had Lingle let the $35 million be applied to furloughs, she could have added roughly six more days to the school year.

“It couldn’t cover the cost of all of the 17 (days) but it could have reduced the number of days,” Stanley said. “If she had done that, maybe the teachers would have volunteered six days too so then you would have been down to five (furlough days).”

Preventing Some, Not All Furlough Fridays

If we consider testimony by the legislative council that oversees stimulus spending and the fact that the governor had sole control over how to spend $35 million on education, Lingle could have at the very least, prevented some furlough days.

And while Abercrombie’s statement seems to imply that furloughs could have been entirely prevented, his point was that federal money could have been used more creatively to keep kids in school. On this, he appears to be mostly accurate.

If the situation was reversed, and Lingle spent the funds on furloughs as opposed to Race to the Top, would that have been the best strategical move for Hawaii’s future in education?

That’s for the voters to decide.

Could the DOE and HSTA also have stepped up the plate and worked more effectively with the governor to prevent furloughs?

Probably.

But as per Abercrombie’s statement, that federal money could have been used to prevent Furlough Fridays, the former congressman is mostly correct. Federal money may not have been the end-all-be-all solution, but it could, theoretically, have been a powerful bargaining chip.