East Meadow school budget plan preserves jobs, programs

With economic uncertainties looming, East Meadow School District administrators have crafted a draft budget for the 2011-12 school year. What is certain is that little help is expected from the state and federal governments, a reality that district Superintendent Louis DeAngelo said was factored into the budget proposal he submitted to members of the Board of Education last Friday.

Nonetheless, DeAngelo said on Monday that his spending plan preserves programs and jobs while attempting to limit the financial impact on district taxpayers. “The proposed budget reflects months of intensive effort on the part of staff at every level to develop a spending plan for 11-12,” he said, “which meets the needs of our children within the resources of our taxpayers during the continuation of one of the most economically challenging stages of our history.”

The current $178 million budget, approved by voters last May, is about 1.7 percent larger than the 2009-10 spending plan. The estimated increase in the tax levy — the total amount the district must raise in property taxes in order to meet expenses — was 1.36 percent.

In the 2011-12 proposal, administrators and school board members project that the spending and tax levy increases will be similar to last spring’s. Those numbers should bode well for the district, even as the state government gets closer to enacting a 2 percent cap on property taxes. The measure, supported by Gov. Andrew Cuomo, was approved by the State Senate on Monday, but still requires approval by the Assembly. It would require school districts like East Meadow to keep tax levy increases below 2 percent or the increase in the Consumer Price Index, whichever is lower.

The impact of the proposed cap on East Meadow remains unclear. “In my estimation, it will not yield the savings for the community that it purports to,” DeAngelo said. “It is an ill-defined concept.”