BOE Continues $132M Budget Talks

The Parsippany-Troy Hills Board of Education spent the primary portion of its Thursday meeting looking for ways to reduce its proposed $132.42 million budget for the 2013-14 school year.

That discussion was far from concluded at this gathering. The BOE decided to gather for a special budget session on Tuesday, March 19, in order to allow members more time to consider the spending plan and potential cuts in hopes of having a finished budget by the March 28 deadline.

The discussion Thursday night was an extended one as various board members bandied a variety of different ideas for line-item reductions.

Superintendent of Schools LeRoy Seitz said that if the members wish to leave taxpayers with a 2 percent tax increase, they would have to cut just over $1.9 million. To reduce the budget to allow no tax increase, he said about $4.2 million would need to be excised from the spending plan.

At present, the preliminary plan would call for a tax hike of about 3.5 percent, which is permissible due to the district's banked cap.

Seitz reminded the board of the budgeting process of 2010-11, when the state Department of Education reduced aid to the district by about $8 million. This, he said, resulted in draconian cuts, including 26.5 teaching positions, two administrative jobs, six secretaries and 13 custodians.

He said items the board considered cutting then included outsourcing custodial service, reducing kindergarten to a half-day program or eliminating it completely, reducing co-curricular programs and eliminating or cutting capital projects.

He cautioned that not including funding to provide for unanticipated expenses would result in drastic reductions in the 2014-15 school budget. The amount budgeted for excess surplus (which reduces the tax levy) in the plan under consideration is $3,009,749.

"We are very conservative," Seitz said. "About 97 percent of the budget gets spent; the rest is needed excess surplus. ... It's not a privilege. It's essential to operate this school district. Excess surplus is a good thing."

The superintendent also advised caution regarding reductions the board opts to make.

"Cuts we make in 13-14 could cause serious problems for 14-15," he said, adding that the financial constraints—and the pain experienced throughout the schools—could be "even worse than we had in 10-11."

The board batted around a number of ideas to cut money from the preliminary spending plan, including:

• cutting music programs (Seitz noted that in 2010, such an idea "wasn't well-received, and rightly so"),
• increasing class sizes in elementary schools to 26 or 27 ("not a tremendous savings, and the community wants class sizes lower than 25, not higher than 25," said the superintendent), 
• cutting a proposed new 9.1 special education positions ("we would actually lose money by being forced to send students out of district," according to Seitz),
• delaying or cutting back the rollout of the iPad program for the high schools,
• delaying the addition of two or more school resource officers.

Seitz said that the administration is recommending that the board pass the budget as is, without further cuts, noting that over the past three years and including the preliminary budget, the average tax levy hike for homeowners amounted to 2 percent.

"It is prudent to keep the programs we have now in place," he said.

"If the board does not have a budget by March 28, the state will either approve what's there or make the cuts," the superintendent warned. "There are literally over 1,000 variables in this budget. If the board could give us a figure to cut, the administrative team can determine [how to get there] and bring it back to the board to consider."

In the end, the board came up with three figures: President Susy Golderer asked Seitz to prepare suggested items to cut based on reducing the plan by $1 million, by $1.5 million and by $2 million.

The special March 19 budget meeting takes place next Tuesday at 7:30 p.m. at the administration building, 292 Parsippany Road. The gathering is open to the public.