Legislation proposed by D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty would cut the community out of the schools budget process until, in the eyes of parents, it’s far too late to have any effect on how public money is spent.

A subsection of Fenty’s Budget Support Act eliminates a requirement that the government hold a public hearing before the city’s school budget is finalized.

If the legislation is approved by the D.C. Council, members of the public would only be able to offer input on how schools are funded after a proposed budget is released. It’s a move that concerned residents say gives citizens little influence on the running of the school system.

“Parents will have no input whatsoever,” said Mary Levy, with the Washington Lawyers Committee, who has tracked the school system for decades. “And they won’t see any information at all until late March. This information is pitifully small in scope ... and absolutely useless to a parent who wants to see what their child’s school will get.”

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Parents and education advocates expressed concern about the proposal on e-mail lists and in e-mails to The Examiner. In February, many vocal community members unsuccessfully sued the city to get access to budget documents prior to the mayor’s budget hearing.

Fenty press secretary Dena Iverson said the rationale is simply to put D.C. Public Schools on equal footing with other District departments, whose budget hearings don’t begin until after the budget is released. The mayor took over the troubled school system last June.

“The provision creates a uniform hearing process for all of the agencies under the mayor’s office,” Iverson wrote in an e-mail to The Examiner.

The difference, though, is that “no other government department has total control over your children for seven hours a day,” Levy said. As such, schools should be much more transparent, she added.

Some parents, though, argue that D.C. is far less open than surrounding jurisdictions when it comes to spending on education.

Montgomery County and Fairfax County school systems have Web sites where visitors can access detailed budgetary documents through the course of the budget process, Levy said.

“It’s just another way that parents in the District are steam-rolled over,” she said.

dlevitz@dcexaminer.com