NORWICH – Shedding light on the new contract for excellence, city school board members and administrators detailed the plans for the district for the coming year.
Deputy Superintendent Margaret Boice said in the 22 years she has been doing the budget, this is the oddest yet. The Norwich City School District is one of nearly 50 schools in the state and one of two in the county to receive additional school funding for the 2008-09 school year. Parents, teachers and community residents gathered for the public hearing Tuesday night to find out more about this year’s budget increase. The adopted budget totals $32,305,709, which reflects an increase of 8.04 percent or $2,678,572 in expenditures. The tax levy is expected to raise 3.94 percent or $383,406. Using recent tax information, administrators explain this means for a property assessed at $50,000, the total tax increase as it reflects the school budget would total $43.
Superintendent Gerard O’Sullivan laid out what caused the expenditures to increase and other aspects of the budget. The administration fees are expected to rise 21.77 percent next year and he explains a lot of the cost relates to the construction happening at DCMO BOCES.
“We are one of the 14 component districts of BOCES and every school pays a portion of the construction fees,” he said. He explains the budget will see a 145 percent increase over last year for the BOCES administrative charge.
The contract for excellence is a portion of state aid that allows the district to have access to $560,000 in additional funding. However, the board has strict specifications mandated by the state regarding how it is spent. The state mandates the areas where the money can be spent and as school board President Christopher Frank pointed out, the state took local control out of their hands.
O’Sullivan said the budget is artificially inflated because of the funding. He explained with the school being on the state’s in need of improvement or SINI list, they are eligible for the contract. O’Sullivan also said he strongly believes the state is making up for traditionally under-funding the district.
The money, as agreed by the superintendent and the board, will mean they can provide a different array of new concepts to the district. Seven to eight new positions will be created, including a full-time teacher in the learning center at the high school, two social workers will be hired to provide each building with their own and a middle school business teacher is being introduced. O’Sullivan explained more changes will also be seen.
Voicing his concern to the board, community member James Fertig asked the board what programs are designed to target the children who exceed the standard. Fertig says from what he has seen over past years, everything seems to be geared towards the students who are classified at the lower and middle end of the spectrum and the students who are at the higher end may not be getting what they need.
O’Sullivan said the board has looked closely at what can be done to aid both the children needing assistance and children who exceed the standard level of learning. He said the television studio was brought back, technical classes will be able to be redesigned and online courses have been introduced. Fertig said it is always admirable to spread funding across all spectrums of children throughout the community.
The growing concern by both school officials and community members was closely related to the funding of the contract for excellence. The state program was introduced by Governor Spitzer and was designed as a four year plan. Funding for the 2008-09 school year is available but as the board noted last night, funding in future years is uncertain. The public will vote from noon until 8 p.m., Tuesday May 15 in all Chenango county school districts.