At the school board's Facilities/Finance committee meeting Thursday night -- a cacophonous affair if ever I covered one -- the message was pretty simple.
Nothing has changed.
Business Manager Maureen Jampo told the committee members that revenues from the previous year remained flat -- due largely to challenges to property assessments which reduced revenues -- while expenses had gone up due primarily to the increase in teacher salaries and increased pension costs.
Use of reserve funds set aside for the pension hikes covered about $432,000 of the $1.4 million budget gap for the coming year. The other $1 million will be covered by the 3.5 percent tax hike called for in the budget.
(In fact, had Pottstown Hospital not been pulled from the tax rolls as a result of being sold to Tower Health, the school budget would be balanced for the coming year except for $36,000.)
Instread, the need to make up the $1 million shortfall hike will add $98.56 to the annual tax bill for a home assessed at $78,890, the borough median.
School Board member John Armato pointed out that during the previous three years, when no tax hike was imposed, property owners experienced more than $1,600 in savings from the homestead tax break, "much less than the increase they will see this year."
At his prompting, Jampo also agreed with his assessment that the only way to achieve a fourth year with no tax hike would be to "cut a whole lot of programs that people do not want to see cut."
As evidence that the district is doing everything it can to cut costs, Superintendent Stephen Rodriguez said the decision on outsourcing transportation department will become final on June 18, producing an expected savings of $78,000.
But, as Rodriguez said Jampo outlined to him, "one student who needs special transportation will eat that in a few months."
Aramto confirmed that the district has one bus run, for two students, that costs the district $98,000 a year.
Despite the budget constrictions, Rodriguez confirmed that the dean of students, security guard and mental health professional provided in partnership with Creative Health would remain at Pottstown Middle School where bullying and violence problems have recently made headlines.
The school board will meet next week to finalize the budget picture, but given that next week does not leave enough time to publish any changes to the budget, you can rest assured that the tax hike will likely remain at 3.5 percent.
The finance committee also engaged in some brainstorming about coming problems, including the pending collapse of the 40-year-old heating system at the administration building and over-crowding at the middle school.
Rodriguez said the issues on the table "have many moving parts," with each potential solution or change incurring costs and setting off a ripple of secondary effects that have to be considered.
None of the things discussed in the Tweets below, he said, are even close to a decision point and none would be implemented in the coming school year.
The committee then adjourned to allow the policy committee to begin discussions of the dress code that must be implemented in the wake of the board decision to do away with school uniforms.
But you must excuse me, dear reader. Having lived through those first initial discussions when the uniforms were implemented, I did not have the core strength to sit through another.
Rest assured, once the board settles on a new dress code, it will be conveyed to you either here or in the pages of The Mercury. But have mercy and spare me the reporting of yet another discussion of what students should wear to school.
So with that, here are the Tweets from last night's meeting:
Show Me the Money
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