Committee Moves Ed Budget Vote to Norwalk High

Now that the controversial, elephantine Norwalk Public Schools budget is passing through the city's budget process like some large meal through a snake's digestive tract—from the Board of Education to the Common Council and the Board of Estimate and Taxation—it's the turn of the council's Finance Committee to face the controversy.

The Finance Committee plans to vote on the city's operating budget and recommend the operating budget cap for all spending—including school spending—to the full council. Expecting a lot of angry parents to show up, the committee initially moved its meeting into the Concert Hall. The Norwalk PTO Council, reminding parents that the public can speak at these meetings, has issued a challenge to "Fill the Concert Hall."

And so the Finance Committee has moved yet again—this time to the auditorium of Norwalk High School, where the meeting will take place at 7 p.m.

The Norwalk PTO Council has been rallying parents to show up at education budget meetings and workshops for the past several weeks. Each meeting has garnered larger attendence by the parents, teachers and students who are the front lines of the budget decisions being wrangled by the politicians charged with managing the startlingly anemic revenue growth of Norwalk.

The parents are active on Facebook, where the United Norwalk Public Schools Campaign has a page. A typical comment details what is at stake. On Facebook, Nancy Wargo posted, "All 8th grade and middle school parents need to know that High School freshman sports are OUTof the budget and their children have no teams to start their high school experience." She calls for parents and students to wear their team jerseys to the meeting.

Last week it was the turn of the Board of Estimate and Taxation to face the controversy. Its meetings are regularly held in a second-floor City Hall conference room, which can accommodate about 20 people. With the education budget proposed under Norwalk's Finance Director Tom Hamilton garnering parent and educator angst, the meeting was moved to the Community Room.

The Finance Committee normally has its meetings in smaller rooms as well, but the meeting was moved first to the larger Community Room, then to the Concert Hall before the latest move to the high school. According to an email sent to Common Council members by city clerk Ellen Wink earlier today:

"THE FINANCE COMMITTEE OF THE COMMON COUNCIL PUBLIC HEARING FOLLOWED BY A SPECIAL MEETING Scheduled for 2/17/2011 WILL BE HELD AT NORWALK HIGH SCHOOL in the AUDITORIUM."

The official agenda made the city web site.

The public gets another crack at speaking about the budget at the next Common Council meeting Feb. 22, when the council is to vote on the city's operating budget and the recommended cap.