New Jersey School District Cannot Account for $20 Million in Missing Funds
Voters have two choices on how to resolve the issue: raise taxes or raise taxes.
The Montclair Public School District in New Jersey cannot account for $20 million in missing funds.
To make matters worse, local officials project a $25 million deficit “over the next four years.”
September
The crisis came to light in September when Montclair Township said it couldn’t help the school district with the $20 million deficit.
Township Manager Stephen D. Marks said, “We are not the federal government, and we cannot print money.”
How did that happen? The school district admitted the deficit “is due to years of unbudgeted for spending.”
“The deficit is the result of money that was spent and was not budgeted, and it appears to me that it’s been occurring over a couple of years,” said Interim School Business Administrator Dana Sullivan, as reported by Montclair Local. “It’s all coming crashing down.”
In other words, Montclair spent money it did not have. Why spend money you don’t have? One resident pointed to entitlement. What a shock:
One lifelong Montclair resident traced the district’s problems back to zoning changes that created a development boom and what he called a “wave of entitlement” which extended to parent demands for more “classes, clubs and amenities.” He also lamented the move from an appointed board to an elected one four years ago.
“Four years later, we’re busted and disgusted. Now we’re facing a $20 million deficit that the board wants a bailout from taxpayers, the majority of whom have no children in the school system, are senior citizens or are longtime residents desperately trying to hold on,” the resident said.
Asking for a tax increase before a full accounting of where the money had gone was like “asking a car insurance company to settle the claim before allowing the adjuster to view the damage,” he said.
Montclair already received $9.9 million from the state for the 2025-2026 school year. That’s a 6% increase from 2024-2025!
Business Administrator
Sullivan said an investigation revealed numerous unpaid invoices and bills “under the school district’s prior business administrator, Christina Hunt, and prior superintendents.”
Hunt hasn’t said a word about the deficit despite demands from parents, teachers, and taxpayers.
Montclair has some of the highest taxes in New Jersey. They want to know how their district ended up in a $20 million hole.
No one has accused Hunt “of criminal or intentional wrongdoing.”
However, a review of audits raised financial red flags from Montclair and East Orange, her most recent districts, since 2021:
According to internal audits of the Montclair Township School District, that system’s business office made transfers “without the required approval,” along with “numerous mispostings of revenues/receipts,” and several line items that were “over-expended” during Hunt’s tenure in 2023 and 2024.
Before Hunt took her post as the Business Administrator for Montclair schools, she managed the checkbook for the East Orange School District in 2021 and 2022. During Hunt’s tenure there, internal audits of the East Orange Board of Education flagged “numerous mispostings of revenues/receipts” along with budget lines that “exceeded available appropriations” and vendors paid “in excess of the bid threshold that were not approved.”
Two years after she left East Orange, that school district announced an $8 million dollar budget gap.
Hunt resigned from her position in Montclair effective July 1, 2025, just as the $20 million budget gap was discovered. Three months later, the school district filed a claim with its insurance company seeking reimbursement of more than a half million dollars, alleging “the failure of Ms. Hunt to faithfully perform and discharge her duties,” when she paid a food service vendor for losses, allegedly without seeking approval of the School Board. Hunt has not responded to questions about the alleged decision to pay that vendor without authorization.
Special Election
So now what? Neither choice is good for the taxpayers and schools.
The township has a special election on March 10, where voters can vote to raise taxes.
Thing is… neither proposal tells voters how much their taxes will go up.
Remember, Montclair has some of the highest taxes in New Jersey!
The Board of Education of the Township of Montclair in the County of Essex shall raise an additional $12,600,000 from taxes over the amount raised in the last Annual School Budget to cover a prior deficit from the 2024-2025 school year. Approval of these taxes will result in a one-time increase to the district’s tax levy. These expenditures are in addition to those required to achieve New Jersey Student Learning Standards.
Do you approve this Proposal?
Interpretive Statement
If approved by the voters, the funds will be used to pay outstanding debts and obligations due and owing from the previous school year. The tax will be non-recurring and will not be built into the base tax levy on which future years’ tax increase limits are based.
The Board of Education of the Township of Montclair in the County of Essex shall raise an additional $5,000,000 from taxes over the amount raised for the current (2025-2026) Annual School Budget for general fund operating expenses for the 2025-2026 school year. Approval of these taxes will result in a permanent increase to the district’s tax levy. These expenditures are in addition to those required to achieve New Jersey Student Learning Standards.
Do you approve this Proposal?
Interpretive Statement
If approved by the voters, the funds will be used for general fund operating expenses, including, but not limited to: reducing the impact of reductions in force among teaching staff, security staff and support staff; addressing ongoing maintenance needs; and mitigating the impact of cuts to athletics, co-curricular and extracurricular programs.
Approval of this tax levy increase will be built into the base tax levy on which future years’ tax increase limits are based.
If neither happens, the district will have to cut activities and layoff many people.
Donations tax deductible
to the full extent allowed by law.
Comments
NJ School District cannot account for 20 million in missing funds
How did that happen? Did they have their DEI math teacher balancing the books?
You don’t need a DEI hire. Just use some of the methods that have been taught in the last 10 and 15 years, and that’s your answer.
Any Somalians in Montclair? Asking for a friend!
Probably never did an audit. How much of that missing money do you bet went to DEI training, staffing, etc?
Former Montclair Schools official Christina Hunt was awarded a $19.5K performance bonus in 2024 — just before the district revealed a staggering $18 million deficit.
A bake sale, perhaps?
Here’s a suggestion. Make every board member, every executive with policy making power, ability to spend or duty to monitor/audit compliance personally liable. Do that for both public and private entities. I suspect if adopted then the amount of vigorous oversight would increase and reluctance to take heedless risks with others money would be somewhat curtailed. Bank goes under? Tough cookies board of directors and SR executives gonna grab your crap, auction it off and if you still owe more gonna have to work it off somehow…and for all I care it can be at $5 a go at a truck stop glory hole.
I am probably way off base. But my take on this is that those so called deficit expenditures are how Hunt hid her embezzlement. The findings in her former post in East Orange (IMHO) show a pattern. One that goes beyond inability to perform her job.
“Cannot Account for $20 Million in Missing Funds”
Cherchez la femme.
From the linked news piece,
“The I-Team tracked Hunt down – about 100 miles away – in her new role, keeping the books for the Penns Grove Carneys Point Regional School District.”
Someone’s director of personnel needs to be fired.
From the story I don’t think Carney’s Point knew any of this when they hired her. They should have contacted her previous employers but HR has gotten very strange. Wife’s HR can only ask previous employers if the person worked there and dates. Carney’s Point, though, should immediately suspend this lady and do a full accounting. Once in incompetence, twice is a criminal enterprise.
A simple Internet search would have tipped off Carney’s Point HR that Ms. Hunt was bad news. Plus school administrators and HR specialists all have their little professional associations that meet regularly to socialize and chat. Hunt was probably well known in the trade but for some reason school administrator find it had to make judgement calls on fellow administrator’s work habits, ethics and professionalism.
I’m willing to bet that Ms. Hunt was a fun person, spewed all of the correct PC lingo and checked all of the necessary boxes so that her ethical behavior and professional practices were overlooked. After all, she was abusing OPM, Other People’s Money. When it’s OPM, it’s not real money.
“If neither happens, the district will have to cut activities and layoff many people.”
I like that option.
Slash and burn, send a message.
Monclair created it. Monclair must solve their own problems. No $ stolen from those outside Monclair.
was denazios wife in charge of this too?
or thats just chump change to them
Pikers. Forsyth County NC schools overspent by $45 million. They have been working to get it down, but major cuts are still needed.
How about they cut administration of which I’m sure there is an over abundance, cut DEI classes, cut all staff involved in it including HR and halt athletics. Request the state do a forensic audit of the books to find out where, exactly, all that money went and who approved the spending then go after them. I simply don’t believe that they can not find where the money went anymore than she wasn’t embezzling it. She was spending money not approved and overpaying contractors.
What I would like to know is that given Hunt’s apparent inability to accurately perform the job in the East Orange School District (internal audits documented that fact) why the Montclair Public School District Board of Education made the decision to hire her for essentially the same job in the Montclair Public School District. What exactly did East Orange tell Montclair about Hunt and her job performance. Or was it one of those, “We only give dates of employment so we don’t get sued for saying anything negative about an applicant.” situations.
Why should they care if they spent too much? It’s not their money!! That’s the attitude of the government. Fill out a form and viola, more money appears out of thin air. Want a new pool for the school? No problem, sigh here. As an added benefit they can then choose who gets to build the pool without worrying about how much it will cost. Over budget? No problem, sign here. Oh, and that contractor building the pool? They’ve done so many jobs for the district there’s no need to check up on them. Especially since they’ll be at the next government sanctioned event in order to line up more contracts. No bid of course.
I still do not understand how you keep writing checks for years that are never paid upon. At some point a vendor sues.
“neither proposal tells voters how much their taxes will go up”
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I’m not going to add anything other than the entire boards and admins should all be put in prison, stripped of all their assets and left to rot in their cells for 20 years or more.
And their families can’t apply for any kind of welfare.
Not surprised.
Many years ago, I was a school board member of a newly merged school district in upstate NY. Financial records were a mess. I spent days with the school treasurer asking questions, getting the figures, and setting up my own spreadsheets. The district had a reserve fund, and I was told that it could not be touched. The district was building a new campus as well. The school treasurer was a nice woman, but totally unqualified for that position. As a district, we had an independent accountant audit the books every year, not only the money trail, but also regulations etc. that must be adhered to. Thanks to him, I was able to determine the reserve fund was exactly what it was, a reserve fund, and could be used. By the time I left the board 6 years later, the district was in good shape and remained so for many years. Now the demographics of the town have changed with many “woke” people moving to the district, many of them gay couples. The enrollment has plunged. The last time I visited, I pointed out that gay people don’t tend to propagate.
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