I was wondering if someone on the list could help me with a question of "current history" regarding the organization of school districts.

Among a few districts in Wayne and Ontario counties lately, there seems to be a flurry of interest in merging existing central school districts (one already covering two villages) into larger entities. My understanding is that the trend toward larger districts faded away about 30 or 40 years ago. In the decades prior to that, the state encouraged districts to merge in order to increase the tax base and reduce administrative costs, thus allowing the districts to pay for more programs and, at least initially, to establish high schools where none had existed. The encouragement took the form of state subsidies for new school construction and transportation costs. I assume the trend ended because people objected to the districts becoming too large and schools too distant, but I can't really say for sure. Since that time, if school systems wanted to do something that they couldn't afford on their own, they tended to finance a specific program jointly with other districts through regional BOCES (Boards of Cooperative Educational Services), without having to merge.

Now, officials in the districts mentioned above are saying that if they merge their districts the state will increase their combined aid by 40% for a period of five years and then reduce it back to what it had been gradually over the next 10 years. Is this provision something new, or has it been lying around quietly only to be remembered in this period of tight budgets? Are other school districts in other parts of the state investigating mergers? Is the state actively encouraging mergers again, or is this more likely a local initiative? I understand New York has more school districts than many other states. Is there a natural limit to how large they should be?

Administratively curious,
Scott Monje