Dr. David Hopson
Our state legislature finally sent a budget to the Governor as the next step in the budget process. Despite not having a budget in place at the beginning of the fiscal year (July 1), we now have an indication of what the district, and our towns, will be getting in state aid. As we’ve indicated consistently over the past several months, the changes from the Governor’s budget (House 1) in January and the House and Senate versions will mean significant changes in local school assessments despite little change in the expenditure side of Gateway’s budget.
Now that we’re all experienced in not having a district budget approved by the beginning of the fiscal year (and we’re not alone in the Commonwealth) I’ll recap the next steps. With the school committee adoption of Version 3.0 of the FY’14 budget on June 26 (a very modest decrease from Version 2.1), the budget has been sent to the towns with new assessment amounts based upon the joint House/Senate budget. Each member town has 45 days from the school committee budget adoption to vote on the revised budget. If a town has already approved a previous version of the budget and the new budget has an assessment equal to, or less than, the version already approved, the town does not need to schedule a special town meeting to adopt the new budget. If a town’s assessment has increased with the new budget, or a town did not approve a prior budget, then the town has 45 days to hold a special town meeting to consider the budget. Failure by a town to hold a meeting within 45 days automatically approves the new budget (M.G.L. C.71, S.16B).
Last week’s state budget changed town assessments as follows: Blandford (-$28,275); Chester (+$28,333); Huntington (-$102,789); Middlefield (-$7,797); Montgomery (-$40,945); Russell (-$72,895); and Worthington (+$117,411). It’s easy to see that the district’s predictions of five towns having a decrease in assessments, and two towns having an increase in assessments (Chester and Worthington) were on target based upon the differences in changes in the Chapter 70 target share (see the Chapter 70 primer on the district’s website for details). Despite these changes, Worthington’s total district assessment is still $22,904 less than their assessment for FY’13.
The district is now operating on a 1/12th budget set by the DESE Commissioner so we will move on with planning for the opening of school immediately following the Labor Day Holiday weekend and are not currently planning any additional changes in the district. To that end, we are working diligently to prepare the physical plant, hire replacement staff, and close out FY’13. We all look forward to the approval of Version 3.0 of the budget so we can focus on other activities as we prepare to continue moving the district forward.
