School Superintendent Suzanne Scallion presented a “draft” of the 2013 district budget last night to the School Committee members, as well as an audience of principals, administrators and teachers, reflecting nearly $2.5 million of funds no longer available which were used to bridge the budget gaps of recent years.
The federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) and jobs programs, which pumped $1,979,664 into the district budget each year for the past three years, have terminated, meaning that the city has to either find a means of covering that funding or reducing staff positions funded through the federal programs.
Scallion presented a 2013 budget that is initially $4.6 million out of line with a preliminary budget number generated by adding projected increased levels of state Chapter 70 funding aid to the current fiscal year budget. Those two numbers add up to $52,546,599, well below the draft budget of $56,790,456.
Mayor Daniel M Knapik said that he does not know what the true bottom line will be for the School Department budget because the budget process is still in a state of flux. Knapik said that uncertainty is “worse this year” than in recent years because the city is negotiating with every employee union. Several of those unions still have not voted to ratify contract proposals, number that could have a major impact on the budget process.
“I can’t give you final figures until I know the impact of the ratification process,” Knapik said during the hearing. “There are situations in other departments we have to address.”
Knapik said that the state budget, which directly affects the city’s budget, is still being negotiated by the Legislature. The city depends on state funding through Chapter 90, Chapter 70 and unrestricted state aid, to build its budget. Those numbers are rarely available to the city when the municipal budget is presented to the City Council for approval and typically very conservative projections of the level of state aid are used in the city’s budget process.
Knapik said that he will continue to work with city financial officials to “crunch the numbers” to give Scallion of firmer budget target by early May.
Scallion said that her administrative team will continue to “refine” the budget draft and will prepare “contingency plans based on various scenarios to cut between $1 and $2 million” from the preliminary budget “while maintaining our primary focus on student achievement.
“As folks retire, we will be looking at every position to see if we can do some restructuring,” Scallion said.
Scallion is also developing a budget without “circuit breaker” funds, money reimbursed to the city for special education student costs exceeding four times the cost of a mainstream student.
Scallion said the actual projected increase in special education spending is about $200,000, but that she put a price tag of $670,000 on that line item because circuit breaker money, used to pay out of district tuition, is not available as an offset.
“Last year, we had two years of circuit breaker funds that, in the past, were available to pay out of district tuition,” she said.
The district is planning to use all of the funding remaining in the current budget as the fiscal years closes this June, projected at about $500,000 when the administration “sweeps” the present budget to apply those funds special education out of district.Scallion said that other offsets include $1 million in School Choice tuition. That program currently generates about $800,000, but Scallion is hoping to increase the number of out-of district students participating in the program.
Early childhood programs will also generate about $200,000 a year, bringing the total offsets to $1.7 million.
Committeeman Kevin Sullivan asked if the district was considering the creation of new positions to address concerns raised by the committee, administration and staff. Sullivan noted that one of the largest and most difficult to either control or project is cost to the district in special education out-of-district tuition, and asked if the district is considering creating a program to keep children in the district.
Scallion said her administration has to look at the issue of autism and its impact on the district, in both terms of delivering services to students and controlling tuition costs. The number of students now being classified as autistic has greatly increased in the last 15 years. Currently, 1 in every 88 students is considered autistic.
Scallion said most of those students are transported an hour to 90 minutes, each way, to attend out-of-district autism programs.
“An autism program would not only keep our kids here in the city, so they can learn and make friendships with other kids from their neighborhoods, but it could also generate revenue because districts are desperate for placements,” Scallion said.
Scallion said that in addition to an autism specialist to manage a program and train staff, she would like to consider adding a dropout prevention coordinator.
“Those are my two top priorities,” she said.
The budget was sent to the Finance Subcommittee, which will begin its review of the proposed budget package next Monday, April 30 at 6 p.m. in the City Council Chambers of City Hall.
