LH looks to pare budget deficit
As members of the Laurel Highlands School Board reviewed another $500,000 in proposed budget cuts Thursday, they learned another $200,000 in reductions will be necessary to balance the budget without a tax increase. During a morning budget committee meeting, business manager Joyce Estocak presented the board with $521,287 in cuts proposed since last week’s committee meeting. An additional $181,000 has been cut from the textbook budget, while another $76,000 was trimmed from equipment expenditures.
Other cuts came from salary adjustments made because of five additional retirements, an insurance adjustment and a $10,000 reduction in board travel expenses. Directors also suggested curtailing most district-related travel for conferences for the 2005-06 academic year.
Tom Vernon, who chairs the committee, said the administration and the board have worked to trim the deficit to adopt a spending plan June 30 without a millage increase.
“That’s our goal: not to raise taxes for this year,” he said. “We’re still making cuts.”
Vernon said the budget includes $320,000 for technology, funds for a new reading textbook series and $80,000 for the school libraries.
According to figures presented Thursday, $809,018 in cuts have been made to the budget since the tentative plan was adopted last month.
Superintendent Dr. Ronald Sheba said realignment among the Title I staff will help to fill a number of vacancies in the elementary schools.
He proposed filling six positions with Title I or class size reduction teachers, but directors stressed that class sizes in the lower grades should remain manageable.
“By realignment and after the bid process takes place, there may only be three positions to fill in the elementary schools,” he said.
Several parents attended Thursday evening’s business meeting to express concern about class sizes at Marshall Elementary School, but both Vernon and Sheba said that additional teachers are included in budget plans to address those problem areas.
To date, the district has had 28 retirements and one resignation, and at least 16 positions have been eliminated through attrition, according to Sheba.
According to information from Estocak, the deficit Thursday morning stood at $107,221, but at the board’s business meeting Thursday evening, directors voted to post an assistant middle school principal/elementary school principal position, which will require funding.
Vernon said the deficit as of Thursday night is around $200,000, but Estocak said that the additional cuts should be made by the end of the month to prevent a tax increase.
In another matter, board members also discussed heating work needed for the field house at the athletic field. Sheba said the facility needs to be open and able to be used by mid-August, and the building needs a heating system.
William Martin, buildings and grounds director, said a boiler system would require a gas line to be installed to the building, adding considerable expense to any work. Sheba said that cost estimates came in higher than expected, and asked the board to allow district maintenance to heat to the facility, with the understanding that directors will review expenditures.
“Maintenance could do the improvements and we should show the expenditures monthly to continually monitor the costs to make this building functional,” he said.
Sheba said work needs to begin soon in time for football practice and then for use by the public during home football games this fall.
Among other matters Thursday, the board set the salary for middle school principal Mary Macar at $80,154.77, hired Natalie Hospodavis as a high school physics/chemistry teacher, hired Chris Mikolowsky as a high school math/physics teacher and hired Kurtis Gantzhorn as a high school Spanish teacher.
The board also accepted the following retirements: Helen J. Fischer, middle school computers instructor; Linda Alexander, Title I Reading teacher at R.W. Clark Elementary School; Jon E. Kruper, high school physical education teacher; Dr. Janet Petlevich, high school business teacher; and Linda Cocciardo, fifth-grade teacher at R.W. Clark Elementary.