Proposed 2019-2020 Budget Approved By TESD, Residents Concerned

TREDYFFRIN-EASTTOWN, PA — The Tredyffrin/Easttown School Board is moving forward with its 2019-2020 budget process, having approved its proposed final budget. But residents are not happy with the way the budget is coming along.

The board voted 5 to 4 to approve the proposal at its April 22 meeting.

Final budget approval is set for June and the board and administration will continue to work to close the projected operating deficit of almost $11 million in the interim.

The 2019-2020 Proposed Final Budget includes $149,578,174 revenue, $3,700,000 fund balance transfers and $153,024,147 for appropriations on a tentative basis.

Property taxes will see a 2.3 percent increase from the legislated Act 1 index and 3.664 percent hike from the PDE-approved referendum exceptions.

Residents, however, are not happy about the PDE-approved 3.664 increase and are urging the board to reconsider the increase.

They say the board was granted the approval after an admitted accounting error regarding billing for Chester County Intermediate Unit services.

A roughly $1.2M invoice from the CCIU for special education services rendered in 2016 and 2017 was incorrectly recorded as an expenditure in 2017 and 2018.

The final property tax rate is not set until the June 10 regular board meeting, the district said.

In addition to the potential revenue provided by a property tax rate increase, the board has worked to reduce the operating deficit by implementing almost $4.4 million in cost reduction strategies.

These approved budget strategies include the shift of Capital Fund funding to contingency, reducing school building and departmental budgets, maintaining the 2018-2019 core class size of one additional student in kindergarten through eighth grade, maintaining the current regular education staffing levels in the high school, reducing projected employee healthcare costs, implementing new printing controls, eliminating proposed staffing by 1.5 full-time equivalent (FTE), and reducing existing staffing by .5 FTE.

The 2019-2020 budget dicsussion will continue at the May 13 Finance Committee meeting at 7 p.m. in the T/E School District Administration Offices.

The T/E School Board encourages public participation during the budget development process and endeavors to reflect the input of joint stakeholders. All School Board committee meetings are open to the public and have public comment periods.

Meeting dates and agendas are available on the T/E School District website online here.

Public comments can be submitted to Arthur J. McDonnell, Business Manager, at mcdonnella@tesd.net or to the T/E School Board at schoolboard@tesd.net.