Participatory budgeting: What schools need to do differently than the city
The success of a Geyser Road project points out limitations and ways around them.
The success of the participatory budgeting process in the City of Saratoga Springs, now in its fourth cycle, has caught the eye of the Saratoga Springs City School District officials who will attempt a similar program with high school students this year.
At its basic level, participatory budgeting is a civics lesson and a chance for people to have a direct hand in how tax dollars are spent.
Since the spring of 2022, city residents have put forth ideas they would like to see funded, the ideas are discussed, added to a ballot and voted upon by the public at-large.
Often the ideas ask for much too much money and have to be pared down or are just shifted to the city’s budget requests where their merits are debated by the city council and funded or not, said Commissioner of Finance Minita Sanghvi. She spoke to the school board on Thursday July 24.
The voting is less official than voting for commissioners or other candidates, but efforts are taken to make sure people do not vote more than once, and the vote on the project comes in December to avoid confusion with elections that take place in November, Commissioner of Finance Minita Sanghvi told the school board. She piloted the program at the city level after her election in 2021.
In 2024, the city funded six projects of 11 on the ballot, the total amount awarded $99,658, according to the city’s participatory budget page.
The sixth was the Outdoor Learning Center, now under construction at the Geyser Road Elementary School. Its budget: $18,933.
School board members talked positively about the process and about the design and construction of the pavilion-style outdoor classroom, nestled inside a fenced area on the Geyser Road Elementary School.
The one problem: The city’s budget will pay only for projects within its borders, and the school system serves the city as well as all or part of the towns of Milton, Wilton, Malta, Greenfield and Saratoga.
The school has set aside $20,000 to $30,000 in this year’s budget to attempt a participatory budgeting process of their own, using the ideas of 9th through 12th graders.
Administrators will ask students to propose what they would like to see, and the top ideas will be placed on a ballot and voted on by the students.
“I think that that's the hope and the idea, you know, that we could have something competitive enough with high enough interest from the student body, that there's, you know, ideas put forth that they're able to put up against each other, and then whatever comes out on top is what gets funded,” Robert “Bobby” Yusko told the Dispatch after the school board meeting Thursday, July 24. Yusko is the assistant superintendent for business in SSCSD.
This can be a civics lesson in the way that government works and is funded.
“That’s what it’s all about,” Yusko said.
On the city side, there is still time to pitch an idea. The theme this year is “The Year of the Child,” and the city is taking ideas until Thursday July 31.
“Think education, health and nutrition, arts and culture, recreation, entertainment—if it helps kids grow, learn, and thrive, we want to hear about it!” the city’s website says. For more information, click here.
