By $716,790—

School Board Trims Budget Proposal

By Larissa Lytwyn

With an emphasis on its responsibility to support quality education while being mindful of Newtown taxpayers, the Board of Education unanamoisuly approved a $716,790 cut to the superintendent’s proposed $58,055,560 education budget at 1:05 am on February 9.

This lowers the education budget from a 9.29 to a 7.95 percent increase in spending.

The biggest cuts included the removal of the proposed personnel director position, which, with estimated benefits, reaped a savings of $85,892.

Superintendent of Schools Evan Pitkoff had proposed the personnel director position because he was typically spending “at least 20 percent” of his day handling a number of human resource issues, including contract and labor negotiations, worker’s compensation, and grievances.

He said that Assistant Superintendent Alice Jackson and Business Director Ron Bienkowski frequently “pitched in” to help with the responsibilities.

Dr Jackson is the primary resource for employees seeking information on Title IX issues, while Mr Bienkowski has been involved in the hiring process of several administrators, including Transportation Director Tony DiLonardo.

The addition of a personnel director, Dr Pitkoff reasoned, would allow himself and Dr Jackson to stay more focused on directly education-related issues, including the streamlining and creation of new curriculum programs and the management of teachers’ professional development workshops.

A number of surrounding towns, including Ridgefield, Trumbull, and Shelton, have personnel directors salaried at a range of $76,000 to $100,000-plus a year, he noted.

While board Chairman Elaine McClure and Vice Chairman Lisa Schwartz said that the personnel director position was necessary because it helped ensure the educational “vision” of the district’s future, the rest of the board was somewhat less confident in keeping the position in the budget.

“I’m not sure if this is the year for a personnel director,” said board member Paul Mangiafico.

The board pondered whether funding the personnel director position would compromise more student-related positions, such as teachers, psychologists, educational assistants, and even clerical staff.

Ms Schwartz said that she remembered the personnel director position being brought up in years past by Dr Pitkoff and even former superintendent of schools John Reed.

Dr Pitkoff discussed the possibility of cutting costs by beginning the position as a half-year one.

Ms Schwartz asked if perhaps a fully qualified retiree could be used full-year; Dr Pitkoff said he was more comfortable with a half-year commitment.

The board then concurred to increase the central office human resource clerical position from half to full time, at an increase of, with benefits, $22,714 as a way of providing Dr Pitkoff some relief.

The board then concurred that it was “just a matter of time” before a full-time, full-year personnel director position would be implemented and ultimately came to a consensus that the 2005-06 year was simply not the year for it.

Maverick Approach

Another major source of cost savings was adjustments to the anticipated diesel and oil rates as well as the health insurance rates.

Currently, the district currently uses about 133,000 gallons of fuel during the school year. While the current budget allocated a $1.08 per gallon fuel rate, fuel is currently costing the district between $1.33 and $1.48 a gallon.

Thus, Mr Bienkowski budgeted a $1.50 per gallon rate for next year.

However, board members David Nanavaty and Mr Mangiafico, as well as Secretary Andy Buzzi, agreed that they could budget for a significantly lower rate.

Mr Nanavaty was particularly adamant on this point. “Fuel rates are dropping right now, and they are expected to continue to drop,” he said.

The board agreed and approved budgeting next year’s allocation to $1.20 a gallon, at a cost savings of approximately $116,700.

Similarly, the board approved lowering the budget allocation for diesel from approximately $1.70 a gallon to a $1.50 a gallon, incurring a savings of $138, 539.

The board also expressed supreme dissatisfaction with Anthem’s exorbitant hike in health insurance rates.

While the trend in insurance increases was as high as 26 percent, Mr Bienkowski budgeted for 22 percent.

Mr Bienkowski also pointed out that it had been a pretty exceptional year. The board is currently handling 12 serious claims that incurred a cost over well over a million dollars.

Last year, the board lowered a 17 percent increase in medical benefits to 15 percent.

At that time, Mr Mangiafico, Mr Nanavaty, and Mr Buzzi each favored “looking for other options” and perhaps going to market to ensure lower rates.

To lower the rate from 17 to 15 percent, the board even met with Anthem brokers. “I was very dissatisfied with the way they didn’t answer all our questions then,” said Mr Mangiafico.

Despite the meeting with Anthem brokers and their strongly expressed desire to explore other options, Mr Mangiafico, Mr Nanavaty, and Mr Buzzi were all vocal in their disappointment that, a year later, “nothing had happened.”

Further, the board uniformly expressed displeasure at the fact that Mr Bienkowski was informed about the rise in health insurance on January 18.

“We should have been informed of this earlier,” said Mr Mangiafico.

During the first public participation session of the evening, parent Bill Sheluck said that he concurred with the board’s frustrations regarding climbing insurance rates.

“But, while you say you are careful not to point fingers, the fingers need to be pointed,” said Mr Sheluck, “and they need to be pointed at the brokers!”

After considerable discussion, the board at last decided to lower their 22 percent rate even further, to 20 percent.

Mr Bienkowski deemed this “a reasonable” request.

Technology Specialist Cut

While the 3.2 technology specialists in the district service 1,723 workstations and 51 servers, many of which incur repair/maintenance requests daily, the board deemed a $47,325 request for an entry-level Technology Specialist I as “important, but not critical.”

Ms Schwartz raised the issue. “This isn’t personal, but while I recognize that the technology specialist position is important, I don’t think it’s critical.”

She reasoned that the savings could be used to directly support student programming.

Security, In-School

Suspension

In his proposed budget, Dr Pitkoff had included implementing a basic alarm system, similar to the ones at St Rose Parochial School and Fraser Woods Montessori School, in each of the town’s public schools.

Each unit was priced at about $3,500, totaling an expense of approximately $24,000.

While Mr Nanavaty and Mr Mangiafico encouraged including the units at the elementary school level, they were far less certain about including them at the high school level.

“There are students coming in and out every day,” said Mr Mangiafico. “There is a constant flow, and I don’t know how effective such a system would be there at this time.”

While he said he was sensitive to parental concern, board member Tom Gissen said he was not sure if implementing a system to any degree would ultimately be beneficial to the district.

The only two schools that had requested the measure were Middle Gate and Sandy Hook School.

Middle Gate Principal Judy Gallo said that Sue Zimmerman, president of the Middle Gate PTA, had approached her with the request.

“While there have not been any specific incidents, it is an issue of concern for many elementary parents,” said Ms Gallo.

She said that implementing a system would no doubt increase demand on the school’s administrators, who would have to monitor the system consistently.

Sandy Hook School Principal Donna Pagé said she felt similarly to Ms Gallo. “I understand the concern, and the times we live in, but I don’t absolutely know how effective such a system would be right now,” she said.

After discussing the issue in depth, the board moved to try out an alarm system at Middle Gate, beginning in the 2005-06 school year. If the system was successful, it could be expanded to other schools in the district, the board agreed. The implementation of just one alarm system incurred a savings of about $21,000.

Dr Pitkoff’s request for an in-school suspension period, meanwhile, was kept.

“I find it ironic that when a student does something inappropriate, such as cutting class, their punishment is staying out of class by being suspended out of school,” said Dr Pitkoff during his budget presentation on February 1. Often, he said, the students view suspension as a “vacation,” he said.

The in-school suspension would be used for relatively minor offenses, such as class cutting.

In addition to being monitored, in-school suspended students would have the opportunity to do their schoolwork.

Over the past year, the school board has spent a significant amount of meeting time revising its substance abuse and discipline policy. Board members, as well as school faculty and administration, overwhelmingly supported the idea of an in-school suspension program.

Additions

Finally, two significant additions were made to the budget. To study the future expansion of the high school, $25,000 was added to the $22,000 allocated next year for that purpose. An exact cost of the project is set to be determined, according to the town Capital Improvement Plan, in the 2006-07 school year.

Mr Gissen, a member of the High School Space Needs Study Committee and professional business developer by trade, said that the $20,000 used by Lawlor Associates to explore construction/expansion possibilities for the high school was just a start. The 2004-05 budget had allocated $25,000; $5,000 is now leftover.

“We are pretty confident at this point, thanks in part to the Lawlor study, that expansion on the current high school site is a limited possibility,” he said. These limitations include the potential elimination of several of the school’s key parking lot areas and athletic fields.

The committee is now in the process of acquiring a second architectural opinion on whether to use the Kent House area of Fairfield Hills for construction.

Originally, Mr Gissen wanted to acquire a total budget of $75,000, a number recommended by Maintenance Director Dom Posca, to ensure further progress on the high school project in the coming year.

“If we don’t have this [addition in funds], I doubt we can move forward,” said Mr Gissen, “and we need to move forward quickly.”

With the $22,000, he continued, the committee could complete “about one-third of a year’s worth of work, while $75,000 could get us much more.”

After some discussion, the board agreed to form a compromise, adding $25,000 to the high school space needs committee budget, for a total of about $50,000.

Ms McClure then asked if it was possible to work more elementary-level enrichment programming into the budget geared toward math and science.

Dr Pitkoff said such enrichment could be worked out either through additional teacher training or increasing time for the elementary schools’ math/science specialists. Either possibility would cost about $25,000.

The board approved the measure.

 

Final Tally

In addition to the removal of the personnel director, the adjustments in oil/diesel and medical insurance rates, alarm systems, and the addition of enrichment programs and further studies regarding Newtown High School space needs, the board made cuts in the following accounts: engineering, $10,000; dumpster rentals, $20,000; bathroom cleaners, $8,000; and Middle Gate interior door replacements, $30,000.

In addition, Mr Posca’s $31,000 request for a new plow truck was cut by $6,000 to $25,000. Adjustments for staff and custodial turnover, as well as the cut of a new high school custodian, totaled savings of about $78,014. The potential addition of two buses proposed due to an increase in rider-ship, particularly at the growing St Rose School, was cut, saving $135,606. Finally, $25,000 in improvements to the town-owned maintenance and laundry buildings was cut. The budget has now dropped from $58,055,560 to $57,338,770.