East Rockaway School District hosts first meeting on 2018-19 budget

East Rockaway School District officials gathered at the high school on Jan. 16 to discuss the budget for the 2018-19 school year.

Jacqueline Scrio, the district’s assistant superintendent for finance and operations, told members of the Board of Education that the consumer price index is set at 2 percent. She said the district’s preliminary tax levy increase is estimated at 2.54 percent, providing slightly under $741,000.

Scrio noted that the tax levy, which is the total amount that a district must collect in property taxes to meet expenses, and the state aid numbers are not final. “The problem is we have no idea what our revenue sources are,” she said. “They are so unpredictable. It’s hard to budget future years when you don’t know what’s going to happen with the only sources of revenue for your school district.”

Scrio presented a graph, which displayed how state aid and the tax levy cap have fluctuated from year to year over the last six years. In 2016-17, the district received 6.86 percent more in state aid than the previous school year. In 2017-18, the district received 0.67 percent more than the prior year.

The cap for the tax levy went from a 1.58 percent increase (2015-16) to a 0.27 percent increase (2016-17) to a 0.88 percent increase (2017-18).

According to Scrio, other budget factors include the contractual salary costs, pensions, health insurance costs and special education. She added that most factors have been analyzed, but some of them are not finalized and were estimated for 2018-19.

Scrio said that because of the unpredictability of state aid and other budget factors that have not been determined, she is regularly looking at ways to scale back on expenses to balance things out.

“I don’t think we’re in a panic state of mind here,” she said. “I would have liked to have seen more money come in from state aid. It would have helped us. I think we’re gonna be a little tight, but I don’t think we’re in a situation where there’s gonna be layoffs or a reduction in programs. I don’t see that at all.”

Scrio said that the district also should be entitled to an extra $1 million based on the Foundation Aid formula of 2007, which was developed to provide more aid to districts with higher poverty rates and lower income rates. The district is projected to receive roughly $4 million in foundation aid for 2018-19, a $10,000 increase from 2016-17.

The formula was supposed to be implemented in 2008, but was put on hold after the recession hit. Superintendent Lisa Ruiz noted that some districts would lose millions of dollars if it was implemented, but added that there was a push for a safe harmless provision. Under that guideline, no district would receive less aid than they were provided the year before.

Ruiz said that despite being a smaller district, East Rockaway enhanced many programs over the last year. The improvements included the addition of skilled professionals, such as a social worker for district-wide support; the extension of the 1-on-1 tablet initiative to grades five through 11; additional clubs; funding for clubs and programs; and facility improvements, which include the addition of air conditioners to the elementary schools and the high school weight room, and the replacement of the outdoor wireless sound system at the high school.

“Even though this is so volatile, we really have made some significant improvements in the district,” Ruiz said. “So, we’ve been very careful in terms of how we budget.”

Last year’s budget for the district was $38.2 million. Scrio will provide the projected number for 2018-19 at a later meeting.

Editor’s Note: The next budget meeting for East Rockaway is on Feb. 6. The Lynbrook School District will host its budget work session on Feb. 28.