Great Math: Spend $1300 to Save $1032
Over $1300. That’s what a referendum election would cost the City of Montrose, according to Carol Flickinger’s (City Finance Officer) estimates. That’s legal fees, ballots, staffing the election, etc.
On the other hand, the tax dollars that would potentially be saved by getting the City out of the Daycare business would be about $1000, based on 2006 year-to-date expenses. And the trend for the past five months has been less and less net spending per month. So the savings could actually turn into zero.
Now, I didn’t graduate from good ‘ol MHS (I’m a Canistota Hawk), but that math doesn’t seem to make much sense to me. Especially when you consider the indirect effect of closing the Community Daycare.
- 8 jobs: lost.
- 13 preschoolers: out of luck.
- 24 families who need daycare service: sorry.
- $292,077 economic impact: gone.
Where will we, the “daycare families,” enroll our kids? I don’t know. Some parents will probably haul their kids to Humbolt, Hartford, Salem or Sioux Falls (and take their payments with them). Some have told me they would consider moving away from Montrose if we didn’t have daycare for them.
What about the school? Without the daycare on campus, parents don’t get familiar with the school and the education we can provide here. If they are new to Montrose, which many of the daycare families are, they are more likely to enroll their kids at West Central or McCook Central when it’s time for Kindergarten–if that’s where they’ve become used to going for daycare.
Bottom line: It’s a big deal for Montrose, folks.
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[...] I want to clarify some numbers that seem to have confused at least one person (and maybe you, too). In a post a few days ago I compared the $1300+ it would cost our City to hold a special referrendum election to the $1032 it would cost the City to operate the Daycare, on average, for all of 2006. Here’s an explaination of my math: On the “quick facts” page, I shared the most recent numbers from the City (a net cost of $732 as of Sept. 16). Dividing $732 by the 8.5 months of operation so far this year (Jan. 1 – Sept. 16), you get the $86 per month. Now take $86 per month times 12 months for the whole year and–whammo–you get $1032 as the estimated net cost for the City to run the Daycare for 2006. There’s the math, bare naked… [...]