No school district is immune to serious budget issues, especially with the tax levy cap that has caused reduced funds for districts.
On Thursday evening, the Marcellus School District held its own community budget forum, where the school board outlined the early stages of the budget-producing process before turning the floor over to residents, parents and students.
“We have a budget gap — our revenue isn’t as much as our expenses are,” Dave Kelly, school board president, said in his opening remarks. “We’re trying to find a way to close the gap while being as respectful as we can to the taxpayers. We’re going to use every resource possible to try and fix this.”
With a spiffy PowerPoint presentation, the school board explained why the district is having monetary issues, some ways to limit the impact and what the estimated numbers are going to be for the 2012-13 school year.
Prior to getting into the meat of the presentation, guest speaker and Marcellus Town Justice Matt Moses spoke a little about why the school held a forum in the first place.
“We don’t want you guys to hold back your questions,” he said. “The school board doesn’t have every answer, so just as you are using this as an information tool, so are we.
“Some of the teachers around here feel they have a target on their back because some people think they are the problem with the budget. They’re not our problem, so we shouldn’t focus on them. Our problem is very simple: underfunding.”
With that, John Fuller, a board member, took the floor to explain the numbers game. This year’s budget was $29,993,883, which was 2.91 percent, or $866,178, less than the previous year. The district’s tax levy, the amount of money the town can’t exceed in taxpayer money, was set at $16,517,406, up 3.9 percent from the previous year. The tax rate is $22.38 per $1,000 assessed value.
For the 2012-13 year, the district is estimating a $2,503,468 shortfall on the projected budget of $30,922,596. The gap has to be made up in various ways, meaning cuts are coming, because the district can’t raise taxes to even things out.
In breaking down the estimated budget, the district found that 11.67 percent goes to general support, 23.44 percent to employee benefits, 10.77 percent to debt and 5.81 percent to transportation. The largest cost was in instruction, which is teachers and staff, which eats $14,938,037 or 48.31 percent of the budget.
Fuller said the district is estimating a $350,000 drop in state funding this year.
“There’s nothing you can do about that part,” Fuller said. “You can’t always trust the state. That’s my own humble opinion.”
There has been a drop in state and federal aid over the last few years, wreaking havoc on school budgets across the nation. In Marcellus’ case, the numbers don’t lie: in 2007-08, state aid accounted for 46 percent of the budget, while property tax made up 51 percent. State aid dropped to 46 percent the following year, 45 percent in 2009-10 and 44 percent in 2010-11. Last year, that number plummeted to 39 percent, while taxpayers had to foot 55 percent of the bill.
The district is predicting $16,957,261 in property tax revenue this year.
Even if the district decided to drain its fund balance — think savings account for the entire district — there would still be a large gap in the budget.
So, how does the district start to fix the situation?
“Program cuts are one way to remedy,” Fuller said.
Afterward, some in the auditorium voiced concerns and even tried to offer help. Mitch Fagan, who has children in the district, inquired if there were any teachers nearing retirement. There aren’t, according to the board, so the option of saving money by bringing in new, young, lower-paid teachers isn’t an option right now.
Neil Benjamin Jr. can be reached at [email protected].
