by David Flint
Interim Business Administrator Scott Hunter and Business Administrator Intern Sandra Owens presented the Berlin School Board with some initial figures for a 2009-10 budget at their meeting on Tuesday. The figures were based on three options. The first option is the status quo option. All four school buildings including Stephentown would stay open. The projected budget increase would be $106,866 and the tax levy increase would be 7.38%. Option 2 moves Stephentown Elementary to Berlin and, with staff reductions and other reductions in utilities and building related expenses, results in a budget decrease of $474,391 and a tax increase of 1.68%. Option 3 would close both Stephentown and Grafton, moving the students to Berlin. This would result in an estimated budget decrease of $888,988 and a decrease in the tax levy of 3.31%.
Although the Board is still operating under the plan of moving just Stephentown Elementary to Berlin next September, the administration was asked to pare the budget to accommodate an expected drop in State aid and still keep any local tax increase close to zero. Interim Schools Superintendent Charlotte Gregory said she was not making any recommendation with these options but just wanted to put all the cards on the table, give the Board a full range of considerations and costs and let them decide. She and the Business Administrators cautioned that it is still early in the budget process, there are a lot of unknowns and there are still a number of school programs that need to be looked at with consideration given to dropping them if they are not working.
These options do not include any major construction or renovation project at Berlin Elementary, but administrators indicated that ventilation would have to be improved and the building made ADA compliant. There would be additional expenses associated with Option 3 since it would displace the computer lab, music room, occupational and physical therapy room and the art room. This would result in art and music programs in classrooms, renovation of the current art room to a classroom, renovation of the maintenance area for occupational and physical therapy and relocation of the computer lab server room to the second floor.
Student enrollment projections for the 2009-10 school year were also presented for the three options. Class sizes are not much affected by moving from the status quo to Option 2, but with Option 3 the number of class sections would be reduced from 24 to 21 and class sizes in grades 1 through 3 would be considerably larger.
Board Member Tom Morelli, noting that the budget projections all included an appropriation of $460,000 from the unreserved fund balance to reduce taxes, objected that this is “building the budget around a false subsidy” and tends to hide the fact that budget expenses are going up. Without this appropriation he figured the real tax levy increase would be much higher. “We can’t close Stephentown and still offer a 9.8% increase in taxes,” he said. If the budget is “subsidized” by appropriating money from the fund balance, he wanted that money to be used to improve academic programs and not just go into general expenses. The challenge, he said, is to re-allocate money to help students to be competitive in a rapidly changing world.
Hunter and Owens emphasized that what they presented is not the budget but just a rough preliminary cut. They plan to present a closer look at preliminary figures in a workshop meeting set for February 4 and then present a first draft of a budget at the next regular meeting on February 24.
Safe Investments
In response to the recommendations of the Board’s External Auditor, Hunter said he had investigated opportunities for enhancing the safety and liquidity of the District’s investments and he was now recommending that the District join MBIA/NYCLASS, an inter-municipal cooperative investment organization. Hunter said this organization has been around for 25 years and has a good track record. He believed it would provide the District with good, safe investment opportunities using US Treasury bills. Hunter said a representative of the organization could be available to answer questions at the next meeting.
May Ballot Items
The Board agreed that there would be four items on the ballot in May: renewal of the 5-year bus lease/purchase plan, renewal of the plan to invest $100,000 in highly aidable ADA compliance projects, the budget and the election of School Board members. Board seats currently occupied by Don French and Julie Darling will be up for election this year.
Superintendent Search
Board Member Beverly Stewart proposed that consulting firms be solicited to make presentations to the Board regarding how they could help with a search and selection process for a permanent Superintendent of Schools. Board Member Liz Miller suggested the Board start with seeing what Questar III could provide. Stewart said the Board might also check with Questar III, but she wanted first to hear from some consulting firms. She also wanted to contact the New Lebanon and Brittonkill school districts which she believed had recently accomplished Superintendent searches. The Board appointed a committee to look into this comprising Stewart, Miller and Julie Darling.
School Closings And Delays
Christine Walsh, an eighth grade science teacher, said she was “extremely insulted” by a comment from a Board Member that implied that very little teaching occurs when a school day is shortened by a two hour snow delay. A two hour delay, she said, is better than no school, and the pace of teaching is not slowed on such days.
Board Member Don French said he had not intended to imply that teachers don’t teach on these days, but he insisted that shortening the day by two hours has an adverse impact on the quality of education that day, largely because students view it as a partial day off and so are not as focused on their work. He noted that in some years the school has used up to 20 two hour delays. French proposed that the District use a maximum of five two hour delays and after that a snow day would have to be used. When the allotted number of snow days has been used, they will have to be made up from vacation time.
Board Member Liz Miller said that as a teacher she had been annoyed by school delays, but she felt it was better to have shortened periods rather than wipe out a whole day, especially when crucial times such as Regents exams are coming up. Snow days, she said, also mean that all extra-curricular activities are cancelled. Miller also noted that making up snow days from vacation time doesn’t result in much quality education time and many parents take their kids on vacation anyway so that absences are high.
Donald Hoffman, a Supervisor with the County Highway Department, chimed in to say that it is the highway people plowing the roads who are requesting the two hour delays so that they can make the roads safe as soon as possible and not have to drive around school buses. With Berlin’s new radio communication system, the Schools Superintendent now communicates directly with the highway people and almost always accepts their recommendations.
Congratulations To Future Cities Team
Board Member Darling offered congratulations to Audrey Vanderhoef and teachers Mrs. Benson, Mrs. Sweeney and Mrs. Lennon who led the Berlin team in the Future Cities Competition the previous Saturday. She praised the students – who won a prize for Visual Presentation of Design ą for a job well done. Darling said there was a good group of teachers, administrators and parents supporting the students and it was a wonderful opportunity for them.
Don’t Forget The Arts!
Andrew Zlotnick of Petersburgh addressed the Board to say he hoped they would not forget the arts in their budget and consolidation plans. If not for art, music and theater, Zlotnick said he himself probably would not have finished school. He said Berlin had some good programs going now and he hoped they would not be jeopardized.
Zlotnick also expressed concern about what he characterized as the appearance of uncertainty, lack of direction and lack of focus by the Board and administration. This perception, he believed, was causing many of his friends to send their children to private schools. Others, he said, would not move into the District because of this perception.
Next Meetings
The Board scheduled a workshop meeting on the budget for Wednesday, February 4, at 7:30 pm in the High School Library. The next regular School Board meeting will be on Tuesday, February 24, at 7 pm in the High School auditorium.