Before we get to the boards, look at what they've put in front of you. Below is the actual scope language from every Capital Reserve establishment proposition Jericho has floated since 2017. Not the annual Prop #2 expenditure votes — those come with named projects. These are the Prop #3s, the ones that ask voters to pre-authorize a $20 million pot of money for a list of "eligible categories" the Board can draw against for ten years.

Read them side by side and try to tell me what has changed.

Every one of these propositions pre-authorizes the Board of Education to use the reserve for "district-wide replacements, renovations, upgrades, reconstruction, additions, and remediation of" the following categories. Here is the full line-by-line comparison:

Nine years. Three $20 million authorizations. One category added — zero-emission buses, which New York State is forcing every district to adopt anyway. Two categories dropped — stadium lighting and tennis courts. That is the entirety of the "evolution" of Jericho's capital planning since 2017.

Real capital planning narrows over time. You fix the roofs; "roofs" gets smaller or drops off the list. You do district-wide ADA; "ADA" comes off. You replace the boilers; "boilers" comes off.

That is not what is happening here. The scope hasn't narrowed because the scope was never the point. The scope is a legal kitchen-sink drafted by the business office to pre-authorize the administration to spend against anything they later decide to spend on. "Additional new space / new building additions" has been on the pre-approved list for nine years straight — and no one from the Board has ever stood up at a public meeting and said "by the way, here's the new building we're planning to add, here's the square footage, here's the cost." It sits there as a blank check, waiting.

And every six years, like clockwork, the Board comes back and asks you to re-authorize the same blank check with a different Roman numeral at the end. Program III. Program IV. Program VI. Same pot, same scope, same term, same cap, same source of funds.

Here is the part that should end the argument on its own. These numbers are not my estimates. They are from the district's own audited financial statements for the year ended June 30, 2025, signed by Cullen & Danowski, LLP, on September 17, 2025.

Jericho's 2025–2026 voter-approved operating budget is $143,870,018. The 2025–2026 tax levy is $118,854,935 — up 2.94% from the prior year. The district has no bonded debt. Zero. The audit states it plainly: "as of June 30, 2025, the District continues to have no bonded debt on its financial statements."

Now look at what they are sitting on. As of June 30, 2025:

Add the restricted general-fund reserves to the capital-projects reserves and you get $53,135,454 already parked in reserves of one kind or another before Program VI adds a sixth pot. That's roughly 37% of a single year's operating budget, set aside in reserves.

And here is the line from the district's own Management Discussion & Analysis that should make every resident stop and reread it:

That is the district telling you, in writing, in an audited report: we have already spent $61 million of your money on capital projects out of reserves we had built up. Without borrowing. Without bonding. Because they already had the cash.

And earlier reporting — reviewed over a 22-year window of the district's own budget-vs-actual history — puts the cumulative structural surplus (dollars collected but not spent in the year they were levied) at roughly $247 million. Not all of that sits in a single account today. A lot of it has been absorbed into reserves, rolled into fund balance, or spent down through exactly the Prop #2 expenditure votes we keep approving. But the pattern is the point: two-plus decades of the administration telling voters "we need X," collecting X, and closing the year with less spent than collected — every single year.

So let's be clear about what's actually happening. The district has been running a shadow capital fund — your shadow capital fund — via chronic over-taxation. It has already self-funded $61 million in projects out of that shadow fund. It still holds roughly $53 million in reserves today. It has zero bonded debt. And now it wants voters to pre-authorize another $20 million reserve on top of all of it.

And the zero-bonded-debt line isn't the flex the district thinks it is. It's the tell.

Most school districts on Long Island — and across New York — fund major capital work the way homeowners fund a house: they bond for it. They identify specific projects, put specific price tags in front of voters, get approval, and amortize the cost over 20 or 25 years. Bonding forces transparency. You can't bond for "roofs, windows, masonry, doors, stairs, elevators, ceilings, lightings, plumbing, boilers, burners, floors, walls, bathrooms, ADA, classrooms…" — you have to bond for this roof, at this school, for this dollar amount. Voters know exactly what they're paying for. The projects are named. The costs are fixed. The accountability is built into the structure.

Jericho doesn't do any of that. Instead, the district over-taxes, builds up cash reserves, and then draws from those reserves against a pre-approved menu of 40+ categories. No bonding. No named projects at the establishment stage. No fixed price tags until the annual Prop #2, by which point the scope has already been blessed years earlier by the Prop #3 vote.

The result is that Jericho residents are paying today's taxes to fund tomorrow's capital work — the exact opposite of bonding, where you spread the cost over the useful life of the improvement and let future beneficiaries share the burden. You are being front-loaded. You are over-paying now so the administration can accumulate a cash pile and spend it later at its discretion, within a scope so broad it covers virtually anything short of building a second high school.

You don't have to take my word for how other districts do this. Look next door.

Syosset — a larger neighboring district — bonds for its capital work. When Syosset voters approved their bond, they didn't approve a blanket menu of 40+ categories. They approved named projects at named schools: a gym addition and cafeteria conversion at Baylis Elementary, a classroom addition at Berry Hill Elementary, a new library at Syosset High School, a turf field and track at HBT Middle, a science research expansion at the high school, locker room renovations at South Woods Middle — project by project, building by building. Each project was designed, submitted to the New York State Education Department for approval, put out to bid, and awarded to a contractor. And Syosset publishes a Bond Projects Progress Report — updated as recently as April 22, 2026 — that tracks every single project through every stage: design, NYSED submission, NYSED approval, bidding, bid awarded, construction. Any resident can look at it and see exactly where their money went, which projects are done, which are in progress, and which haven't started yet.

That is what accountability looks like. Named projects. Named schools. Named costs. Public tracking. State oversight via NYSED. Debt amortized over the useful life of the improvement so that future residents who benefit from the work share the cost — instead of front-loading everything onto today's taxpayers.

Now look at what Jericho gives you: a copy-pasted scope list of "roofs, windows, masonry, doors, stairs, elevators, ceilings, lightings, plumbing, boilers, burners, floors, walls, bathrooms…" — no named projects, no named schools, no NYSED submission, no public progress tracker, no bonding, no amortization. Just a $20 million pot of cash, a ten-year authorization, and a promise that the administration will figure out the details later.

Syosset bonds and tells you exactly what you're getting. Jericho stockpiles your money in reserves, hands you a blanket menu every six years, and calls it "fiscal responsibility" because there's no debt on the balance sheet. There's no debt because you already paid for everything up front — you just didn't get to choose what.

Now the uncomfortable part.

Program III passed in 2017 under one board. Program IV passed in 2020 under another. Program VI is on your ballot in 2026 under a board that many of you fought to elect — a 3–2 majority that was supposed to mark the end of the nonsense, the end of the former superintendent's puppets, and the beginning of real fiscal responsibility. The board that was supposed to be different. The board that was supposed to finally challenge a business office that has been engineering surplus by design for over two decades.

And they put Program VI on the ballot on a 5–0 vote. Unanimous. Not a single trustee — not the three who ran as the reform majority, not the two holdovers — voted no. Not a single one asked why the scope language was a word-for-word copy of 2020. Not a single one asked why a district with $72 million in fund balance and $53 million in reserves needs to pre-authorize another $20 million reserve. Not a single one demanded that "additional new space / new building additions" come off the list until the administration actually tells residents what building they intend to add.

Five to zero.

Make it make sense.

Here's the only way it makes sense: the board doesn't write these propositions. Victor Manuel, the Assistant Superintendent for Business, does. The Assistant Superintendent for Business has been orchestrating this playbook — the same scope language, the same reserve structure, the same rolling re-authorizations — across multiple boards, multiple superintendents, and multiple election cycles. He drafts it, the district's counsel signs off on it, and the trustees get a packet at a work session with a motion already written. "This is how we've always done it." "State law requires a reserve for capital work." "Here's the resolution." And the board votes yes. Every board. Every time.

The financial architecture of this district is not controlled by whoever won the last election. It is controlled by Victor Manuel, who has been running the same playbook since 2013, when the very first Facilities Improvement Program went on the ballot. Superintendents come and go. Trustees come and go. The business office stays. And the template stays with it — not by accident, not by necessity, but by design. Trustees are tenants. The business office is the landlord. And the lease has not been rewritten in thirteen years — not by a progressive board, not by a transitional board, and not by the current reform majority.

Here's the hard truth: the issues the reform majority ran on and the issues the business office quietly controls are not the same issues. You elected trustees to push back on curriculum, library content, personnel decisions, and the cultural drift of the last decade. They are, in fact, doing that. But the budget and capital architecture was never on the campaign. Nobody ran on "we will stop re-authorizing rolling $20 million capital reserves on top of $53 million in existing reserves." So when Victor Manuel handed them the same Prop #3 their predecessors voted for, they signed it — not out of betrayal, but because it wasn't on the list of things they came to change.

The result is the same either way. The ballot doesn't know who voted for it. The reserve doesn't care which trustee is in which seat. Program VI will sit on the books for ten years regardless of who wins the next three elections.

And since we are heading into another trustee election, let me save you some time.

Don't worry about the candidates. Don't worry about who's running. Don't worry about their platforms, their endorsements, their lawn signs, their flyers, or the Facebook groups cheering them on. It doesn't matter. It won't matter. The votes will be the same.

I know that sounds defeatist. It isn't. It's the lesson of the last nine years, written in black and white across three identical Prop #3 ballots and one unanimous 5–0 vote by a board that was supposed to be different.

Program III passed under one board. Program IV passed under another. Program VI — the same pre-authorized $20 million blank check, the same thirteen-year-old scope list, the same template drafted by the same Assistant Superintendent for Business — is on your ballot right now under a board that included the reform majority many of you fought to elect. Every one of them voted yes. Every single one.

You can elect the most fiscally disciplined, reform-minded, watchdog candidate on the ballot this spring, and when the next Prop #3 comes around in 2032 — and it will — they are overwhelmingly likely to vote yes on it too. Not because they're corrupt. Not because they're lying to you on the campaign trail. But because the proposition will not be written by them. It will be written by Victor Manuel, the same way he's written every one before it. It will land in front of the board at a work session with a motion already drafted. And the trustees — whoever they are — will sign it. Because nobody ran on "I will refuse to put the next Program VII on the ballot." Nobody ran on "I will demand pay-as-you-go from fund balance." Nobody ran on "I will force the administration to bring voters a named project list instead of a pre-approved menu."

Until somebody runs on that, specifically, and wins on that, specifically, and has a majority willing to fight the administration on that, specifically — the outcome doesn't change. The names on the ballot change. The proposition doesn't.

So this cycle, don't worry about the candidates. It will not matter, and the votes will be the same, like it or not.

And understand what you're being told.

You are being told this reserve is necessary. It is not — the district has $53 million in reserves already, $72 million in fund balance, no debt, and a written admission in its own audit that it has already self-funded $61 million in capital work without borrowing.

You are being told that having no bonded debt is a sign of fiscal health. It isn't — it's a sign that you've been over-taxed for decades so the administration can pay cash instead of bonding like virtually every other district. Bonding would require naming specific projects, attaching specific costs, and getting voter approval for each one. The reserve system lets them skip all of that.

You are being told the scope language is boilerplate required by state law. It is not — the categories are chosen. "Additional new space / new building additions" is a choice. "Zero emission buses and infrastructure" is a choice. The business office drafts the list to give the administration maximum latitude, not because Albany requires it.

You are being told Program VI is about roofs, windows, ADA, and keeping the buildings safe. Maybe it is. But the ballot doesn't say that. The ballot pre-authorizes a menu of 40+ categories including new construction, and once voters approve it, any project that fits inside that menu can draw from the reserve at a future Prop #2 vote — a vote where the only question left is "how much," not "whether."

You are being told this is how it has to be done. It isn't. It's just how it has always been done here.

Whatever the candidates say on the trail, whatever promises get made about fiscal responsibility, about transparency, about taxpayer respect — watch what happens when the next establishment vote comes around. Watch the board meeting minutes. Watch the vote tally. And remember that you were told, here, now, that it would be unanimous, or close to it, and that the proposition would look almost identical to the three before it.

You're all being lied to. Not by the candidates, necessarily — most of them probably believe what they're saying. You're being lied to by a system that lets the same template get re-authorized every six years under a different Roman numeral, by an administration that counts on you not reading the scope language, and by a structure that hands trustees a packet and calls it "governance."

Let's stop pretending. This is not a failure of one board or one ideology. This is a nine-year, three-cycle demonstration that Jericho voters will approve whatever the administration puts in front of them, as long as it's labeled "for the schools" and wrapped in a photo of smiling students.

We approved Program III in 2017. We approved Program IV in 2020. We are being asked to approve Program VI in 2026.

Each time we are handed the same copy-pasted list. Each time we are told it's necessary. Each time we are not told that the district already holds $53 million in reserves, has no bonded debt, has already self-funded $61 million in capital work out of prior reserves, and has a 22-year track record of structural surplus. Each time we are not told that pay-as-you-go is legal, common, and used by districts across New York. Each time the only "debate" is about which specific items to fund under the next Prop #2 — because the establishment vote, the one that actually matters, was decided in a tiny-turnout May election most residents didn't even know was happening. And when residents do show up — as they did in May 2025, when 81% voted yes on the budget — they vote yes on whatever is put in front of them.

The trustees change. The superintendents change. The ballot doesn't. And the voters — us — keep pulling the lever yes, because somebody told us to, because we don't have time to read the scope language, because "it's for the kids," because the alternative feels like voting against schools.

It isn't. Voting no on Prop #3 is not voting against schools. It is voting against a thirteen-year-old template that no board has been willing to rewrite. It is voting against pre-authorizing "new building additions" that nobody has publicly proposed. It is voting against a $20 million blank check on top of $53 million in existing reserves, $72 million in total fund balance, and zero debt. It is voting for the idea that Jericho should do what other districts do: bond for named projects at named prices, amortize the cost, and let voters decide project by project — instead of hoarding cash in reserves and spending it against a menu.

But it won't fail. Because it never does. Because we are the suckers, and every board — left, right, 3–2, 5–0, activist, reform, passive — has figured out that we will sign anything.

Enjoy Program VI.

Enjoy Program VII in 2032, when the same scope list comes back with a new Roman numeral, the administration that wrote it is still there, the trustees who signed it are somebody else, and the voters who approved it are the same ones who approved III and IV and VI.

Enjoy continuing to fund the machine under the guise of the "number one school district" — a ranking every surrounding district has caught up to while you weren't looking. Jericho has good teachers. That was never the question. The question is whether the financial apparatus around them — the $144 million budget, the $72 million in reserves, the rolling $20 million blank checks — deserves the credit for the outcomes this district likes to advertise. Because let's call a spade a spade: a significant share of the academic results Jericho takes a bow for are produced by the tutors, the test prep, and the college consultants that you pay for out of pocket, on top of the $118.85 million tax levy you're already funding. The district's rankings reflect this community's wealth and this community's parental investment — not some unique institutional magic that justifies handing the business office another decade-long reserve fund every six years.

Enjoy watching "additional new space / new building additions" finally get used, six or seven years from now, for a project nobody campaigned on and nobody was specifically asked about, funded from a reserve you pre-authorized in 2026 because the ballot said "capital improvements" and you trusted them.

The board changed. The vote was 5–0. The proposition didn't change. That's not a coincidence. That's the whole story of how this district is actually run — and who's actually running it.

And it isn't us.