Proposed budget for Charleroi School District may include tax increase
The Charleroi Board of School Directors approved a proposed $24,123,000 balanced budget for the coming school year at its monthly meeting Tuesday evening. However, a tax increase remains uncertain and additional budget cuts may be made to mitigate the tax increase.
The district’s current millage rate is 15.8306 mills. Raising the millage rate to the index will increase taxes to 16.38 mills or $16.38 for each $1,000 of assessed valuation of taxable property.
This increase would generate an additional $291,850 for the district. The tax bill for a $100,000 assessed property value would increase by approximately $55. Currently, the proposed budget comes with a 0.55 mil tax increase.
According to Superintendent Ed Zelich, the district is making several cost-savings measures to balance the 2018-19 budget, including joining a new healthcare consortium, eliminating positions through attrition, restructuring administrative positions, outsourcing technology services, creating an in-house K-12 cyber school, combining transportation routes for efficiency, freezing additional compensation for extracurricular activities/athletics and partnering with the Charleroi Regional Police Department to provide security on campus.
“This budget reflects our plan to succeed,” said Zelich. “It is a blueprint for building on past accomplishments and funding future achievement. We crafted the 2018-19 budget with our most precious resources at the forefront — the students of the Charleroi Area School District. We are placing significant emphasis on supports that will also provide our staff with the tools to grow our success.”
The proposed 2018-19 budget reflects an increase of $573,000 over the current spending plan.
Zelich added that the public can comment on the proposed 2018-19 budget during a public meeting at the Charleroi High School Community Room on 7 p.m. June 26. The board is scheduled to vote on the final budget after the public meeting. The full budget proposal can be found at http://www.charleroisd.org/DistrictBudget.aspx.
Also, during the meeting, Zelich announced that the Pittsburgh Business Times ranked Charleroi Area School District as the 24th highest-scoring overachieving regional school district, based on state standardized test score performance. The Pittsburgh Business Times ranked 105 regional school districts for this assessment. Charleroi Area School District also ranked 62nd on the 2018 local honor roll rank.
In other business, the board:
n Named Brady Barbero, a learning support teacher at Charleroi High School, as part-time athletic director for an annual salary of $8,500.
n Approved the 2018-19 Mon Valley Career and Technology Center budget.
n Approved the CCL Technologies IT support contract, at a monthly rate of $3,300.