With the towns of Blandford, Chester, Huntington, and Russell turning down the Gateway budget, the budget now returns to the school committee for review. I believe it was the hope of the school committee that the district would have news of potential mitigation funding from the state before the recent town meetings but, with their summer recess, the legislature was not able to take up the FY’15 supplemental budget until this fall. This was the reason that I agreed with the Chester Selectboard’s recommendation that the special town meeting vote down the district’s above minimum contribution, certainly the first time that the superintendent agreed that towns should turn down an assessment request!
The problem remains that the district stays in unchartered territory regarding its budget and the issues surrounding the Worthington withdrawal. Potential mitigation funding would go a long way towards resolving the immediate budget impasse; however, that still leaves the potential for court action on the Worthington lawsuit. Should the request for an injunction stopping Worthington’s withdrawal be granted, the school committee would have to develop another budget that would include the items that are not reflected in the current budget (developed without accounting for the Worthington students). When these factors are incorporated into the legal requirements for budgeting for regional school districts (thirty days for the school committee to redo the budget after the towns turn down a request and then forty-five days after school committee adoption for the towns to vote on the new budget request) it becomes difficult to make an informed decision and reach some type of consensus.
During these tumultuous budgeting times it is helpful that the law also provides for the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) Commissioner to set a one twelfth budget (based upon the prior year’s budget) on July 1 so that students can return to school and the district continues to operate for the benefit of the communities. If the school committee and district towns are not able to reach agreement and put into place an approved budget by December 1, then the DESE Commissioner is authorized by law to establish a budget for the remainder of the school year as well as “assume operation of the district”. Thus, to put it simply, the district will continue to operate and educate our children even if a budget isn’t set into place by the district and its member towns.
As one can imagine, the fact that we’re still working on a final budget for the current fiscal year is putting some constraints on developing the budget for the next fiscal year. The FY’17 budget is seen by many as the real ‘transition’ budget for the district in accounting for the differences between a seven and six town district and considering how to best move forward in aligning the district to this new configuration. Hopefully the current unknowns will become known allowing the district to have an established base of knowledge to move forward in meeting our students’ needs. As part of this process, there are two activities occurring fairly simultaneously – the district’s “2025 Visioning Process” and GTAC’s “Gateway Collaborative Task Force”. While the 2025 process relates exclusively to planning the school’s future and is being operated in a similar fashion to the Gateway 2015 process (which originated in 2005), the GTAC Task Force is looking at district and town sustainability, potential alternatives for town and school operations, and includes the potential for economic development. With a little work and collaboration, the results from these two efforts should provide some ideas for everyone to consider.
