SOUTHWICK – The Commonwealth is now five months into the fiscal year and the budget remains a moving target, something Southwick-Tolland-Granville Regional School Finance and Operations Director Stephen Presnal is tracking diligently.
Presnal told the Regional School Committee this week that the House Ways and Means and Senate Ways and Means committees released their proposed budgets last week, a month after Gov. Charlie Baker proposed his latest FY21 budget. The district budget was created last spring, based on Baker’s budget proposal at that time, which has changed during the pandemic.
Stephen Presnal speaks to the Southwic-Tolland-Granville School Committee. (THE WESTFIELD NEWS PHOTO)
“The governor did modify his numbers and the House and Senate budgets, in some ways, are identical to the governor’s,” Presnal said. “A sharp contradiction is in regional transportation, which is down $253,000 from where the governor had it and from what our budget is based upon.”
Presnal said district member communities’ required assessments could increase, but so far, the district is in good shape.
“We are in a good place with our existing budget for FY21,” Presnal said. “This is an actual-to-budget scenario.”
Despite the state not having a Fy21 budget in place, the district is looking ahead to next year and has its budget roundtable for FY22 this week.
