Sunday, June 15, 2025
Michael Van Wart is the Superintendent for Finance & Operations for the East Rockaway School District currently overseeing the district’s budget, which will go before voters on May 20 with a proposed levy increase of 1.95 percent.
Herald: What have been the biggest changes in the district’s budget from this year to last year? Were there any major challenges or achievements?
Van Wart: For us, the challenge this year has been fiscal. We're in negotiations with the teachers right now, and what tends to happen is a lot of the agreements get front-loaded in the first couple of years. We’ve settled four contracts in the past year, and now we're absorbing all the salary increases in this year's budget—plus the benefits we negotiated with them as well.
State aid is always a concern. Because we're small, about 20 percent of our budget relies on state aid. The rest is from the property tax levy. In New York State, the tax cap prevents us from raising property taxes by more than approximately 2 percent, with some fluctuation. So when state aid doesn’t increase significantly year over year, it creates fiscal challenges.
Herald: Have there been any sacrifices made in the budget this year?
Van Wart: Not for this year—knock on wood. We're in a pretty good financial position. The former Assistant Superintendent, Mrs. Rio, who retired before I took over, put the district on a good long-term trajectory.
During the pandemic, a lot of federal funds came in, and schools across the state received a decent amount of federal support. Some districts used that money for recurring expenditures—things that carry over year to year. This past year was the last year for that federal funding. If you didn’t plan well to absorb those recurring costs into your operating budget, you could be in the position that a lot of districts are in now—having to lay off staff.
In our case, we were not in that position. Much of the federal funding we received went toward non-recurring costs, like HVAC improvements for better ventilation and filtration. Where we did add staff using that funding, we planned to absorb the cost later through the operating budget. So we’re in a relatively good financial position.
Herald: Do you know how much of the funding for these types of extracurricular or innovative items, like 3D printers or therapy dogs, comes from the Educational Foundation compared to the operating budget?
Van Wart: It’s a very small percentage. Our operating budget last year was $45.2 million. The Foundation typically provides a couple thousand dollars a year. I believe their endowment is never more than $40,000–$50,000. It depends on the year, but they try to support us as much as they can financially.
Herald: In Lynbrook, I heard there's a disconnect between the special education funding formula and actual costs. Does East Rockaway deal with similar issues?
Van Wart: Yes. I’ll keep it relatively high-level, but here’s how it works. The state gives aid for high-cost students—you can think of it like a deductible. Each student may require services like speech, physical therapy, occupational therapy, or even a one-on-one aide. All those costs are added up for the student. If they cross that deductible threshold, the costs beyond that point become aidable.
The issue is whether that deductible threshold is appropriate. For a district our size—East Rockaway has about 1,100 students and 150 teachers—we don’t have the economy of scale that larger districts do. A larger district might have many students needing similar services, so they can keep staff in-house. For us, if just one student needs a specific service, we might need to send them to BOCES or a private program. That tuition can be expensive—some students cost up to $200,000 annually between tuition and maintenance.
Given our $45 million budget, that’s a sizable impact. And we don’t see the aid for that until the following year or even two to three years after.
Herald: How does the district plan to deal with unfunded mandates, such as the electric vehicle bus requirement?
Van Wart: The zero-emission bus mandate still affects us, but not as severely as districts with 50–60 buses. Still, we’ll need to buy electric chargers and eventually replace our buses. The state did allocate funding toward this transition in the upcoming budget, and they’ve created some waiver processes, but we don’t know all the details yet.
We’re trying to figure out what it’s going to cost. Maintenance for EVs is still a question mark. They're new, and we don’t yet know whether they’re more cost-effective over time. For now, we’re planning for it, but it’ll be a heavy lift—even with only four buses.
Herald: If you had unlimited funding—or even just a little more—what would be your “dream” project for East Rockaway?
Van Wart: That’s a tough question. But I think we’d love to have a pre-K center. Right now, our pre-K program is mostly off-site with community-based organizations. We definitely have space constraints—our central administration is in the high school. If we had the funds, we’d build a dedicated pre-K facility, create new instructional spaces, and bring those programs in-district.
It would absolutely be something instructionally focused—creating additional opportunities for students.
