Editor, Gazette-Journal:

The recent use of $400,000 in surplus money to make up a deficit in teachers’ salaries by the Gloucester School Board is being presented by some of the Gloucester supervisors as the reason for considering control of specified categories in the school department’s budget. The use of the $400,000 has nothing to do with control by the supervisors of categories in the school budget.

Objections to use of surplus money by the school board must be dealt with by having the supervisors and their financial officers carefully follow the overall spending of school monies. That should be the goal of the board of supervisors in matters of this nature.

The question of control by the supervisors of the school department’s budget by categories is a horse of another color. It represents an unadvised intrusion into operation of the school system. The supervisors do not need to resort to micromanagement of the schools’ budget in order to look after ...