31.   Indeed, almost all the people at the senior center said they regularly voted against school budgets.

32.   Instead, the Legislature pours money from trust land into the regular school budget, offsetting the amount coming from taxes.

33.   It devours a huge share of the school budget while condemning most of its students to isolation and failure.

34.   Its decision to cut jobs could devastate the school budget and result in property taxes so high that even more people may want to leave.

35.   Job-training, school budgets and community programs have been cut back, and bigger cuts are likely next year.

36.   Local taxpayers now vote on their entire school budget every year.

37.   Massachusetts requires school budgets to be submitted by the first Wednesday in February.

38.   Ms. Speakman also said that in school budgets inefficiencies are often spread throughout the budget.

39.   Nevertheless, school administrators contend that local school budgets have been singled out unfairly, in large part because school taxes are the only taxes subject to voter approval.

40.   One is that the mayor never really cared about reforming the system at all, but merely wanted a handy excuse for cutting the school budget.