Sources & Methodology

You should be able to see how I got there.

I don’t expect anyone to trust a campaign website just because it looks polished. When I use a number or make an argument, I want residents to be able to tell what came from an official record, what I calculated, and what is my own interpretation.

Methodology reviewed: September 16, 2026

FACT

Directly reported information

A fact is reported by an identified authoritative source. Important facts should link to a source and preserve material context such as whether the amount is proposed, revised, audited, adopted, or final.

CALCULATION

Derived from identified facts

A calculation uses documented official inputs and a reproducible method. A result is not called an official fact simply because all of its inputs come from official records.

ANALYSIS

My interpretation or position

This is where I explain what I take from the facts and calculations. I keep that separate so my interpretation cannot be mistaken for a statement by Livingston Public Schools, NJDOE, or another government body.

Not every official number means the same thing.

Budgets change as they move from proposed to revised to adopted, and audited actuals answer a different question altogether. I want those differences to stay visible instead of blending official numbers together just because they come from the same district.

Final/adopted: used for the adopted General Fund appropriation and tax levies.
Revised/Proposed: used for broad year-over-year categories in the 2026–27 UFB.
Actual/Audited: used for the FY2021–FY2025 historical current-expense model.

Primary sources used in the first evidence page

Audited current-expense calculation

For each fiscal year from FY2021 through FY2025, the historical model begins with the General Fund Schedule C-1 Total expenditures — current Actual amount. It removes separately reported non-budgeted state TPAF/on-behalf payments to derive locally budgeted current expense, then extracts salary/wages, health, other employee benefits, out-of-district special-education tuition, and non-salary transportation once each. The balance is the calculated “remaining current expense” residual used on this site.

That residual is a methodology tool, not an NJDOE category and not a judgment that every included dollar is discretionary. FY2023 also contains a one-dollar source-subtotal inconsistency in the audited schedule; the model preserves that discrepancy rather than silently altering an account.

If I get something wrong, I want to correct it openly.

Evidence-heavy pages show a review date. If I need to correct a meaningful factual point after public release, I want to say so rather than quietly rewriting the page. Newer official information may also replace older observations, and when that happens the date and source status should make the change clear.

Transparency commitment

I’m comfortable saying, “I don’t know yet.”

If the public record does not yet support a conclusion, I would rather leave the question open than fill the gap with an assumption. Good analysis should make uncertainty visible, not hide it.