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Schools

District Budget and State Aid Cut Discussed At BoE Meeting

Board of Education set to ride out tough financial times ahead

The hot topic at the recent Massapequa Board of Education meeting was the release of the district's budget and the announcement that New York state Governor Andrew Cuomo would be cutting aid to schools statewide.

Deputy superintendent Alan Adcock gave a budget presentation covering debt service, general support, employee benefits, transportation, and community services of the 2011-2012 proposed school budget, which totaled at $71,360,507, an increase of $3,871,004 over the 2010-2011 budget.

Adcock said a combination of pre-planning on the part of the Massapequa school district and a slightly lower than anticipated state aid cut means that Massapequa students aren't in dire straights...at least, not yet.

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"On February first, the Governor came out with the budget, which cut State aid to Massapequa by $973,797," Adcock said. "Actually, this is a smaller decrease than we had anticipated, but nonetheless a cut."

Adcock said that school taxes that have so many Long Island residents complaining is due to the constant cuts in state aid to the districts over the years.

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"Let's go back to 1970 in this community," he said. "51 percent of this school district was paid for by New York state, and the local resident was taxed on 45 percent of those costs. If you fast-forward to 2011, and this is without the Governor's aid cut figured in yet, we're getting about 13 percent of our costs paid for by New York state, and the residents pick up 81 percent of the total tax bill."

"We pay a lot of income taxes in Massapequa, and that money goes up to Albany," Adcock added. "And that money is distributed to primarily to needy school districts. Massapequa is not considered a needy district by New York state. We don't have a lot of non-English speaking children, and we have relatively high income and property wealth. That's what drives aid these days."

Adcock stressed the increased efficiency of the district's spending over the last decade as a contributing factor in those figures not being even worse for taxpayers.

"Massapequa had come from a place ten years ago where it was the tenth lowest-spending school district in the county on a per-pupil basis," he said. "Now we're the fourth lowest, under spending the average district by $4300."

Adcock went on to point out that the district managed to accomplish this while at the same time creating and maintaining successful programs for kids and raising student achievements to some of the highest in Nassau County.

"Our students are achieving at very, very high levels," he said. "Whether it be in the classroom, or on the field, or in the gymnasium, they are achieving. We are, without a doubt, a high-value school district."

The Board's budgeting efficiency has resulted in a "rainy day" fund of excess saved money which will now be used to offset the state aid cuts in order to maintain the programs and jobs in place in the school district. In the meantime, additional ways to economize will be sought out.

Adcock said that, despite the Governor's cuts to aid, next year's budget would still be a reduction if it weren't for several other factors beyond the Board's control.

"The budget you're going to look at tonight would actually be a decrease of about $910,000, if it weren't four areas," Adcock said.

First off, there is a mandated New York State Retirement System increase, followed by a first for the district: a mandated Nassau County sewer and water tax.

"Nassau County has created a new tax for school districts, based on how much water they use," Adcock said. "For 40 or 50 years, school districts were exempt from paying this fee, but for next year, the county has enacted that legislation. Our cost is an estimated $275,000."

Also combating the school's budget is another new tax being levied upon the district, this one controversial: A Metro Transportation Authority tax.

"This is the second year of the MTA tax, which costs our budget about $300,000," Adcock said.

Health insurance cost increases rounded out the four factors that are preventing the Board from coming in under-budget for next year.

"We want you to know that our goal is to continue being a very conservative cost school district," Adcock said. "Our goal is to have a budget and school tax increase this year that's under two percent."

Charles Sulc, superintendent of schools, assured those in attendance that the district remains, as it always has been, forward-thinking in regards to its spending goes.

"I don't think anyone in here should walk away tonight thinking that we're not into long-range planning as far as budgets go," he said. "We're looking to preserve what it is we have afforded our youngsters and where we have grown the program and enabled kids to achieve higher levels of success than we've ever had before."

"We're into this kind of recession for about two years now," Sulc added. "We gave some money back to the community in terms of fund balance to offset their taxes, and we were able to replenish those accounts. Why? because of some of the creative things we did, along with the financial plan we had in place. We have some real issues going forward, but I believe, from a financial side, we've positioned ourselves well, and we're going to continue to do whatever we can to continue that position. And we need the community to support us."

The next regularly scheduled meeting of the Massapequa Board of Education is Thursday, March 3rd, at 8pm.

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