Board split on $100K bump for special ed., staff development

Correction: the '18-'19 budget proposal is $104.8 million.

For its last line item meeting of the year, the Board of Education reviewed numbers pertaining to staffing, employee benefits, debt services, and the fund balance. Superintendent Dr. Peter Giarrizzo also presented a five-year revenue projection to trustees, which details the district’s financing sources for the budget through the 2022-2023 school year.

The allocations for employee benefits, which come from the state, are up over $1 million from 2017-2018. The section includes retirement, social security, workman’s compensation, and other benefits for 800 North Shore employees.

The district’s debt service and interfund transfers account for $4.3 million of the proposed budget. The tax anticipation notes issued by the Town of Oyster Bay to North Shore are down $10K from 2017-2018. To curb concern about the deduction, Giarrizzo said that the state comptroller had issued the district a fiscal stress score of zero.

Giarrizzo said that for the 2018-2019 school year, instructional personnel would be reduced by 5.8 percent with the proposed budget. Overall staffing numbers are consistent with prior years, however, with the number of district administrators, non-instructional workers, and clerical staff remaining unchanged.

Trustee Marianne Russo commented on the number of administrative staff, which is currently 28. She suggested that in future years, the district should work to streamline the number of administrators. “Other districts don’t have as many administrators as we do,” Russo said.

Before agreeing to adjourn discussion on the budget, Giarrizzo asked trustees if they were comfortable with the numbers and lines he’d proposed. The total 2018-2019 proposed budget is $104.8 million, an increase of approximately 3 percent from the year before.

The total keeps North Shore $300K below the tax levy; however, Trustees Sara Jones, David Ludmar and Board of Education President Toni Labbate, while impressed with Giarrizzo’s proposal, recommended the superintendent add $100K to the budget at his discretion, citing sections like special education and staff development that could use the additional funds. Special education received a $200K decrease from 2017-2018, while staff development decreased $50K.

Labbate said, “We’re undercutting ourselves by allowing $300K to be left out.”

Ludmar inferred that the current budget lines for special education do not account for students moving into the district who may require additional services. Russo answered his point. “The contingency you’re concerned about is already built-in to the budget,” she said.

Jones said in the grand scheme of the budget, $100K is not that much money. “We’re taking the long view picture to address pressures that require us to cut it really close,” she said. When Jones introduced a motion to add the extra funds, the majority ruled to keep expenditures the same.

The board will vote to adopt the proposed budget next Thursday.