The Haddonfield Public Schools Board of Education unanimously approved the initial submission of the 2016–2017 tentative school year budget to the county at its meeting on March 17. The proposed budget general fund is $36.1 million. If approved, it would result in the average home assessed at $488,481 paying an increase of $172.61 per year in school taxes.
“We have a 2 percent tax levy cap, and since I’ve been here, we’ve been under. In terms of expenditures, everything is way above 2 percent. We’ve been working hard to get it under or as close to 2 percent as possible … we did this without cutting positions, staff or programs … Everyone did a remarkable job getting it as close to 2 percent as possible,” Superintendent Richard Perry said.
At the meeting last week, the budget was presented to the public and the board for the first time, with general fund expenditures proposed at $36.1 million and a total tax levy for the general fund at $33.8 million, which is a 2.45 percent increase over 2015–2016.
However, at the March 17 meeting, a reduction was made in the medical benefit costs. Business administrator John Christopher Oberg said he was advised the estimated health-care costs could be reduced by $60,000, so that money was taken out of the tax levy and reduced the amount to the health-care adjustment by the same amount. This resulted in a change to $33.7 million for the total tax levy general fund, which is a 2.28 percent increase over 2015–2016. This includes the use of a 2 percent tax levy, an allowed adjustment to go over the 2 percent cap for enrollment and health-care costs and a reduction from the Debt Service Fund.
Adjustments to the 2 percent tax levy cap allowed by the state to go over the 2 percent include enrollment, health care, pensions and debt service. According to BOE president Glenn Moramarco, HPS has never used this allowed adjustment to go over the 2 percent cap.
Due to the increase in health-care costs and the predicted increased enrollment at HPS, it was recommended to use the allowed adjustment for enrollment and waiver for health benefits. The enrollment adjustment totaled $308,600, and the health-care cost adjustment totaled $98,452.
HPS received $1.31 million in state aid, which is an increase of $33,950, due to more students coming in the 2016–2017 year.
A significant decrease from the revenues in the budget was in tuition revenue with a loss of $98,000. This is due to tuition students graduating as well as not having the space to include more tuition students at the schools.
Additions to the budget include a part-time maintenance engineer and a new special education program. The new staff hire is for preventative maintenance of the school district’s facilities. The new program will be a savings of $95,000 because of consolidation of services. It is a one-year pilot program.
No other additions or cuts to staff or programs were made in this budget.
The newly passed bond referendum numbers are not included in the 2016–2017 budget. The bonds would not be sold until July. Because of that, the first payment would not be due until the following year, which will be included in the 2017–2018 budget, according to Oberg.
Members of board present that night unanimously approved the submission of the 2016–2017 tentative budget. Those not present were Mary Fagan, Drew Hansen and Heather Paoli.
The public hearing for HPS is planned to be held at the April BOE meeting on April 28 at 7 p.m. in the high school library. Changes can be made between the initial submission of the budget and the public hearing.
In other news:
• Longstanding board member Hansen is resigning from the BOE, due to a work reassignment that will take him overseas.
• Commendations and certificates were given to Elizabeth Haddon third graders Cleo Cottone and Ryan Tourtellotte and J.F. Tatem Elementary fifth graders Gabriella Kraft and Audrey DeCristofaro for receiving first and third place for their Spanish videos in a video contest. The Foreign Language Educators of New Jersey asked world language teachers in New Jersey to submit a one-minute video of their students speaking in the foreign language to share the value and joy of learning a world language. The winning videos will be on FLENJ’s website at videocontest.flenj.org.
• The BOE approved a shared service agreement with the borough in regard to the lights project for the high school stadium. HPS had to take down the lights due to the wooden poles rotting. Wooden light poles are no longer approved, according to Perry. Since recreation teams often use the school’s lighting, HPS and the borough are sharing costs for the lighting. If approved by the borough soon, and bids come in and approved, there is a good possibility the lighting will be in by the end of school year, according to Oberg.
