Elmont School Board President Aubrey Phillips has recently proposed a summit to explore alternate means of funding education. Too bad, but such a summit will only divert attention from the real problem. Mr. Phillips' objective should be to cut hiring by improving productivity and to put a lid on outrageous teachers' salaries, not to look for new ways to get more money for an already bloated education system.

Mr. Phillips is wrong if he thinks that having an income tax to fund education is the way to go. It will hide the true cost of the schools, which would make school administrators and unions happy.

Income tax receipts vary with the economy and are not sufficiently stable to fund education. Landlords who don't report income from illegal rentals will not pay their share. Neither will cash businesses nor the wealthy with tax shelters.

School administrators continue to ask Albany for more money despite the fact that New York State, with a looming $6 billion budget gap, is facing one of the worst fiscal crises in history. New York currently spends more money per pupil than any other state in the nation, topping the US average by 47 percent.

Mr. Phillips should concentrate on controlling skyrocketing teachers' salaries and the cost of their benefits which have been rising at three times the inflation rate. That constitutes 75 percent of the school budget and is causing school spending and school taxes to skyrocket. Where does this money go? Not to the children, but to teachers and administrators in pay and benefit increases.

The top teachers' pay in our school districts is now $104,100 and will jump to $107,500 next year. For a 10-month school year, one teacher with a base pay of $95,000 gets nearly $20,000 more for coaching sports, resulting in a paycheck of $114,000 for the year. A school superintendent is paid $240,000, plus benefits, or nearly $65,000 more than Gov. George Pataki earns.

If you are an average retiree on Social Security, you will get a $161 increase in benefits next year, but your school taxes will probably go up by another $600. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand that school taxes will double in five years if they continue to increase by 14 percent each year, as they did this year.

The teachers' union is the richest and most powerful lobby in Albany and no legislator who wants to stay in office will oppose the union's demands. Mr. Phillips and other school board members are the ones who must take positive steps if we are to halt the upward salary of school spending and tax increases.

George Rand