School Board Proposes Zero Percent Tax Increase in Preliminary Budget

The Lacey Township Board of Education has crafted a budget that will not raise taxes for the second straight year.

Spending cuts and increased revenue has allowed the board to keep the tax rate stable for the 2011-12 spending plan, which has yet to be adopted before its tax levy goes to voters April 27.

“We did make cuts to the budget and that was part of the no tax increase. The other part is the revenue we are receiving from the Solar Renewable Energy Credits and we are also returning additional money from the bond referendum towards this budget,” Business Administrator James Savage said.

In addition to a zero percent tax increase, the district is proposing no layoffs or cuts in school programs, said Jack Martenak, vice president of the school board. Martenak credits the $1.1 million gained in solar credits and approximately 35 percent in electric bill savings.

“That was one of our goals as we started to work on this budget and it was a big question mark until we knew what the state aid values were going to be,” Martenak said.

After a $4.6 million cut last year, there was an increase of $612,488 in projected state aid for 2011-12.

The spending total has increased by $2,418,227 within an overall budget of $68,886,794.

“This year’s budget is basically maintaining what we did last year. There’s nothing extraordinarily new in it,” Savage said

The increase in the budget is primarily a result of salary increases and benefits, which the district was contractually obligated to provide after last year’s salary freeze, Savage said.

The salary freeze saved approximately $1.3 to $1.5 million in this years budget, Superintendent Richard Starodub said.

“Because of the salary freeze and the solar project, we were able to do some things that a lot of schools across the state won’t be able to do,” Starodub said.

Teachers and staff will receive a 3.95 percent increase this year.

The district is also planning to restore a portion of the new math series for kindergarten to second grade. Professional development and training as it relates to testing and a new math series will also be restored.

The district will also move forward with its technology plan for the middle school, although they will take out bids to lease over a few years rather than purchase.

Cuts that were made over the course of last year’s budget and this year include personnel for co-curricular programs, computer modification, teaching supplies, maintenance and custodial overtime, expenses in library, and the textbook and workbook account, Starodub said.

If the local tax levy does not get approved, the district will look at staff and program reductions as well as the pay-to-play program for all co-curricular activities, Starodub said.

It was the school board’s goal not to cut any co-curricular programs or charge any students to participate in those programs as well as preventing increases in class sizes through layoffs, Martenak said.

Without the revenue generated from the solar credits and the savings in electricity from the solar energy project, Martenak estimated about 30 staff members would have been laid off.

“We worked very hard to maintain reasonable class sizes. Because that is key to the education our students receive,” Martenak said.

Sixteen positions were vacated through attrition and the school does not intend to backfill those positions. It cannot be determined at this moment how many positions will be vacated through retirement in the upcoming school year, Assistant Superintendent Vanessa Clark said.

Savage said the preliminary budget should be approved early next week.

A public hearing on the school district's budget is scheduled for March 28 at 6:30 p.m. in the Lacey Township High School Lecture Hall.

For information on voting, click .

Below are the proposed figures for the preliminary budget:

Budget Category

2009-2010 Actual

2010-2011 Revised

2011-2012 Anticipated

Local Tax Levy

37,029,824

38,379,406

39,413,121

Total Local Repayment of Debt*

3,585,425

5,065,599

5,112,788

Total Operating Budget

60,148,610

60,734,199

62,413,706

Total General Current Expense

59,827,726

60,350,249

62,083,264

Total Expenditures

65,800,332

67,378,837

68,866,794

*The total overall debt of the district is over 50 million. The district pays portions of this debt each year. For 2011-2012, the district will be paying over $5 million towards that debt. The district will also be giving $3,280,000 from the bond for the solar energy project back to the taxpayers this year.