Progress Made, Money Saved

With Monday evening being one of the first warm ones of the spring, perhaps it's not too surprising that only 11 people showed up for the Region 9 Board of Education's budget hearing. The roughly 30-minute meeting held at ended before 7:45 p.m. Questions and comments were short, simple, direct and few.

“This meeting doesn’t usually get a lot of parents out," said Gina Pin, assistant principal at Joel Barlow High School. "We’ve had a lot of parents speak out at every meeting [prior]."

“This was the fifth or sixth meeting,” Region 9 Chairman Mark Lewis said. “The very last meeting is low attended.”

The purpose of the meeting was to “keep Barlow a premier high school,” Lewis said.

“Parents feel that their children are getting a private school education,” stated Pin.

The parents showed their appreciation Monday morning before the hearing by setting up signs for the event, according to Pin.

“The parents we have at this school are very supportive of the budget. They will be our big allies now,” she said, adding that the PTA plays a big part in pulling support from the community.

Lewis, along with his fellow board members presented 11 slides that showed a clear calculation of enrollment trends, factors affecting the budget and expense reductions and additions. The board is already thinking about next year’s budget and would like the residents of Redding and Easton to think about it as well.

“This meeting covers the with the fiscal year starting July 1,” Lewis said.

On October 1, Lewis said, the board will begin the process of creating a budget for the 2012-2013 fiscal year. The board has seen some of its lowest budget increases over the past few years, and according to Lewis, it would like to continue the positive change.  

With a rise in student enrollment, how did the board keep their increase at the current 2.3 percent? The answer can be found in the number of retired teachers, faculty and staff. With so many people retiring, the school board has more leeway to keep within their means while maintaining a rewarding experience for students.

Former Joel Barlow student Nicholas Lepanto attended the meeting. He felt that when he was in high school the budget didn’t come as a worry to students, but it did affect the experience for him and his peers.

“We lost our tech-ed [class] when they did renovations,” he said. “They went for a more academic curriculum; the emphasis was more geared towards the stereotypical college curriculum. They worried about white collar professions.”

Now a UConn student, budget meetings play an important role in his education. Lepanto was assigned to attend a town meeting, bringing him back to the high school he graduated from in 2008.

Reductions in the 2011-2012 budget include:

• 0.76 percent in outside tuition for special needs students;

• 0.72 percent in retirement savings;

• 0.28 percent in debt service;

• 0.24 percent in electricity; and

• 0.09 percent in transportation.

The advantage to the transportation cut is that the school has fewer outplacements, bringing more students to Joel Barlow. The school currently gets more students from Easton than it does from Redding, according to principal, Thomas McMorran.

“If it [the budget] doesn’t pass, are there other opportunities to cut it,” asked Richard Bloom, a Redding resident.

“We would naturally want to see how votes affect each town,” Lewis said. He explained that in the case that the budget does not pass, the board would have to take a look at several factors that include pension committee involvement and the special education budget.

“It all depends on what the voters have to say,” he added.

Anne Kipp, another of Joel Barlow’s assistant principals said “it was a clear budget with no ambiguity to it.” She appreciated the way that it was presented.

Residents can view the meeting in a week on channel 79. For more information can be found at the school board's website.

Board members encourage all residents to vote. The anticipated referendum date is May 3.