District Deals With Additional 20% Budget Cut
by Alex Brooks
New York State notified school districts last week that it will begin implementing an across-the-board 20% cut to State aid. The State said it will restore some or all of this funding if the Federal government sends aid to states or additional aid to education, but with such measures stalled at least temporarily and possibly permanently, the State will begin subtracting 20% from aid checks starting right now.
Hoosick Falls Superintendent Patrick Dailey said his District has formulated a three phase plan of budget revisions to adjust for the new funding cuts. The first phase is an immediate 10% reduction in spending involving a total of $1.1 million in budget adjustments. Dailey said this first phase can be accomplished with no loss of programming and no staff reductions. The second phase would be a 5% budget revision in January, and the final 5%, if necessary, will be decided on sometime in the winter.
Elements of the budget adjustments used to achieve the initial 10% savings included cutbacks in the number of kids who will attend the CDC in Bennington, skipping application of a planned seal coat on the parking lot, and elimination of expenses for extra-curricular activities that are not happening because of the pandemic. There were some significant savings in the latter part of last year because of things that were not happening because of pandemic restrictions. School Business Administrator Emily Sanders said there was a surplus of $407,000 from last year, which created a fund balance larger than it is supposed to be. She said there is $500,000 of fund balance “that we have to spend” which provided almost half of the $1.1 million in savings needed for the initial 10% budget reduction. She said, though, if the full 20% cut is implemented, $412,000 more will have to be cut from the budget, and there will be no painless way to do that.
Superintendent Pat Dailey said the last 5% is the worst. There would be nowhere else to find that savings but cutting the school resource officer or sports, or staff reductions. But there remain many uncertainties about the upcoming year, and some may add expense and some may cut expense, (or add revenue) so it is too soon to say what the impact of such budget cuts might be later in the school year.
One of the uncertainties that Dailey discussed is the operational status of the Career Development Center (CDC) in Bennington, where HFCS sends many of its vocational students. The CDC is not able to open up for normal operation, and is instead planning to run virtual classes online. Dailey noted that for a vocational school, this is a significant reduction of the educational value being delivered. He noted that the CDC courses usually result in the student getting certification in the trade they are studying. But if the CDC is not able to open for in-person learning, the students can’t get certification. Therefore HFCS is sending seniors who have already spent a year studying at the CDC so they can finish out their time there, but is not sending any new students to start there. The CDC plans to re-evaluate its remote learning decision by the end of October, and that may perhaps provoke HFCS to re-evaluate its participation.
Tax Rates Set
The Board passed the School District’s tax rates for this year. The rate per thousand for this year is in the first column, last year’s in the second column:
Town 20-21 19-20 increase
Grafton $19.73 $19.62 .56%
Hoosick $19.72 $19.62 .51%
Petersburgh $32.66 $30.92 5.63%
Pittstown $32.12 $30.46 5.45%
White Creek $30.35 $31.24 2.85%
The bills will be mailed by the end of August.
ReOpening
Superintendent Pat Dailey said he spent three and a half hours this week talking to the teachers about reopening, and going over all the details. He said it was the first time he has talked to the teachers about this, and it was a good discussion.
He said he has received responses from 91% of the parents so far, regarding a parent survey asking them about whether they want to opt out of in-person schooling, and how they plan to transport their child to school, and if they have access to internet, computer, etc at home. He said 11% of the students will be opting out and choosing 100% virtual learning, and 40% of the parents will be driving their kids to school. The survey, he said is critical to the District’s planning for the upcoming school year and urged parents who have not yet responded to send in their responses.
Dailey said the part he is most worried about is entering and exiting the building. He has been discussing protocols with the State Health Department, and they are very firm about insisting that the District strictly enforce the rules: if a student or teacher has a fever of 100 degrees or higher, or has any Covid symptom, they may not enter the building, and if they show any symptoms during the school day, they must go home immediately. Since symptoms of the common cold and other mild illnesses may be the same as Covid symptoms, there may be significant numbers of kids who have to go back home on any given day, and the District needs to plan how this will be handled.
Lunch Increase
District Business Administrator Emily Sanders said the price of school breakfast and lunch must be raised this year, because the Cafeteria has been losing money due to the increased cost of food and rising staff costs because the minimum wage is going up. The breakfast price will go up by 25 cents and the lunch price will go up 30 cents for students and 31 cents for adults. Elementary breakfast will be $1.50 and elementary lunch will be $2.75. High School breakfast will be $1.75 and High School lunch will be $2.75. Adult lunch price will be $4.30.
Capital Project Update
Facilities Committee member John Helft said the two new hot water heaters have been installed and they are operational. The boilers are expected to be delivered this week and the contractors hope to have them installed and begin testing them by mid-September. This is a few weeks ahead of the original project schedule. Business Administrator Emily Sanders said she will seek a bond anticipation note of $2.5 million soon to pay for phase one of the capital project. An interest rate lower than originally anticipated is expected.