The financial struggle between the two elected boards of St. Mary’s County – the Board of County Commissioners and the Board of Education – was clearly visible at the budget work session Tuesday afternoon.

The school board representatives were conspicuously absent from the budget work session, and the commissioners took another $200,000 from the already approved school budget and put it in the commissioners’ reserve fund.

Savich said that seldom does a budget request, put forth by any department, get complete funding. When asked if the further cut might be considered by the school board as adding insult to injury, Savich conceded, "Maybe."

“I don’t think they boycotted it,” Commissioner President Jack Russell (D, St. George Island) said about the absence of school representatives at the budget work session. “I think school Finance Director Dan Carney is out of town and could not show up.”

Privately, the commissioners had been accusing the school board of not doing their homework right, though they did not discuss St. Mary’s per-pupil spending as compared to the neighboring counties of Charles and Calvert Counties.

Russell said there were a few questions that have yet to be answered by the school board before the budget season ends.

“We have to balance the budget by [May 29th].  Everybody is working very hard, including the school board,” Russell said.

At a public hearing four weeks ago at the Great Mills High School, dozens of citizens appeared and spoke in support of school Superintendent Dr. Michael Martirano’s budget, after the commissioners cut $2.5 million from his budget request.

Mattingly told The Bay Net that St. Mary’s County was not in a position to compete with Calvert County’s school system budget, since Calvert had better tax revenues from the Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant.

The St. Mary’s Commissioners have yet to come forward with a satisfactory answer as to why the school system was getting just 43.8 percent of the general expenses fund, whereas Charles County is planning to spend more than 52 percent.

But Savich explained budget making mechanism is unique to each county, saying, “It’s what it is (in St. Mary’s).”

Savich said that the school budget was growing much faster than the county’s revenue increases.

“The revenue increased by seven percent but the school budget increased by 12 percent,” Savich said.

“Are we reducing class size?” asked Commissioner Dan Raley (D, Great Mills) about the logic behind the request for more teachers. He said since 40 more teachers are being added, he would like to assume, “We must be reducing class size.”

In the absence of school board representatives, many questions that the commissioners had went unanswered. The county’s Chief Financial Officer Elaine Kramer answered many questions, saying, “I have no idea, I don’t know.”