Announcement re March 25, 2010 budget forum

BURNT HILLS: Burnt Hills-Ballston Lake school district residents are invited to attend the third and final community forum on next year’s school budget at 7:30 PM on Thursday, March 25 in the O'Rourke Middle School cafetorium, 173 Lakehill Road.

The previously announced location of the East Glenville Fire Hall has been changed to the Middle School to accommodate both a larger audience and a simultaneous online presentation of the forum.

The forum is titled "Maintaining Good Schools in the Worst Economy since the Great Depression."

For more than six weeks, administrators and school board members have been refining budget proposals and collecting input from the public, staff and students. Soon the Board of Education must make a decision on the budget to put before the voters at the polls on May 18.

The March 25 forum is intended to present the nearly complete 2010-11 budget for public inspection and comment. Superintendent Jim Schultz will describe:

		What the probable loss of $1.6 million in state funding next year will mean for BH-BL programs.
		What services & staffing are currently slated to be cut.
		What this will mean for BH-BL children.
		What this could mean for BH-BL school taxes.

After 38 years with the Burnt Hills school district as a teacher and an administrator, Schultz says that creating a balance between the needs of children and the needs of taxpayers has never been tougher than it is this year.

He is recommending a package of 47 specific changes that would reduce the district's preliminary 2010-11 budget by $1.5 million. These changes include the loss of 24.6 staffing positions in full-time equivalents (FTEs), which break down as follows:

	Administrators:	Reduction of 1.2 FTE or 5.7% of current administrators
	Teachers:	Reduction of 10 FTE or 3.6% of current teachers
	Support staff:	Reduction of 13.4 FTE or 4.6% of current support staff

Other reductions include lower spending for supplies, equipment, staff training, summer school, and a variety of other services.

"We know that it's not possible to cut this many staff and offer the same programs we do now," says Schultz. "We will see fewer electives at the high school, and somewhat higher class sizes in many spots across the district next year, but given the economic pain that residents and taxpayers are feeling this year, the Board and I agree that we need to minimize the school tax increase."

Schultz's recommended budget comes to $53,406,188, which is only 0.07 percent higher than the current year's budget of $53,368,860.

The tax impact of Schultz's recommended budget will likely be somewhat higher though, because BH-BL stands to lose $1.6 million in state aid revenue if the legislature approves Gov. Paterson's aid proposals. If this loss of aid does occur, the school tax levy is expected to grow by 2.2 percent

Online participation offered

Read all about Online access to the March 25 Forum here and view recordings of the 1st and 2nd forums

The district will broadcast Thursday's budget forum live over the internet as a virtual town hall meeting or "webinar." This means that interested persons can come to the Middle School and participate in person OR can tune in and participate via their computer as long as they have high-speed internet access and speakers. (Important note: the software we are using for the online meeting sends us a copy of ALL THE COMMENTS people type in during the meeting. So participating from home is actually a very effective way of sharing your thoughts & concerns with the Board of Education.)

Multiple reduction efforts underway

In an effort to reduce costs and save jobs in 2010-11, BH-BL has offered a retirement incentive to its bargaining units and asked them for concessions.

School board members are actively lobbying legislators on behalf of the district and have formed a Legislative Task Force in hopes that many local residents will join them in seeking long term reforms and mandate relief from Albany.

The board also plans to spread its $2 million fund balance over the next two years to reduce taxes. "As bad as the state's economy is right now, we need to remember that things could be considerably worse next spring when New York has spent all its federal stimulus money," says Schultz. To avoid falling off this "funding cliff," he explains, the BH-BL school board is currently planning to apply $1 million of its fund balance to the 2010-11 budget and $1 million to the 2011-12 budget.

Superintendent's recommended budget

Schultz presented his recommended budget to the Board of Education on March 16 in a worksheet with a prioritized list of budget reductions.

This worksheet will be the focus of discussions at the March 25 forum. It is actually the fourth version of the list of potential cuts to be shared with the public via the district website. Earlier versions in this evolving process were made public on February 26, March 1 and March 9 as Schultz received new input and data from residents, staff, students and Board members.

"Our goal all along has been to respond to residents' financial pain while doing the least damage to children's education, but there's no easy way to cut something that has already been cut and cut again in previous years," notes Schultz.

"I hope that residents who take the time to read the list of cuts will see the care we have taken to spread the pain across the district in ways that don't decimate any one area yet still provide tax relief," he says.

Residents' opinions needed

Participants at Thursday's forum will be asked whether they could support a budget based on the superintendent's recommendations with a 0.07 percent budget-to-budget increase and a 2.2 percent probable tax levy increase over the current year. "We know that some people feel these cuts go too far and some feel they don't go far enough," Schultz says. "Board of Education members are looking for this information and to know the reasoning behind people's opinions."

The BH-BL school board is scheduled to have one more Finance Committee meeting on March 31 and to vote on the proposed budget on April 13.