Sadly, for Michigan, this is likely to be the start of several years of austerity at all levels. We’ve lost our ability to locally control our budget through property taxation. Now, we have to live with the impact of that loss of local control. It’s critical that the available budget allocation from the State be prioritized into education first, support second. In the community, we look to you and the School Board to make the tough decisions regarding how the schools will operate within this budget framework.