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02/09/2016 01:30 PMWith budget planning season starting to wind to a close, the Board of Education (BOE) voted to approve the proposed 2016-2017 budget on Feb. 1. The $58.6 million plan is a 1.99 percent spending increase from the 2015-2016 approved budget.
The board voted unanimously to approve the budget after agreeing to reduce Superintendent of Schools Paul Freeman’s budget increase request by $494,000. BOE Chair William Bloss said the reduced budget increase will be reflected in a reduced number of teaching positions at the elementary school level.
“There will be reductions in teaching positions; the precise number of reductions will depend on enrollment, but it will likely be about six,” he said
Freeman agreed with Bloss that the staffing reductions are linked to declining enrollment. The district is currently predicting a loss of 80 students in the coming school year, but Freeman emphasized the reduction would have little impact on class size.
“We can absorb those reductions without increasing class sizes in Guilford, so I don’t want people to think this means we are increasing class size, we are just keeping track with enrollment,” he said. “We also believe that because of retirement and teacher movement, we believe that these reductions will not cause any sort of layoffs at this time.”
Noticeably absent from the approved budget were financial considerations for the possible change in school start times. Bloss said there are currently too many economic factors at play to make a final decision.
“School start times will not change in September,” he said. “At a minimum, the bus contract must be renegotiated because it would be a change in service levels and would require different staffing and more buses. We had estimates from our consultant of a cost of $250,000 to $600,000. In the absence of a firm number, it would be impossible to include a budget item that would assure that any change, if approved, could actually be implemented.”
Freeman said that while the busing issue will continue to be a challenge, the district is working closely with the bus company, Student Transportation of America, to investigate different options. The district’s contract with the company is not officially up for renegotiation until June 2018.
“The bus contractor has been great and they have been working with us on this topic for more than a year now,” he said. “We are going to have to sit down and discus the implications of any changes to all of the parties involved and clearly they have a big financial stake in this as well and I know they are willing to have those conversations with us.”
Of the multiple busing models available, Freeman said many community members seemed to favor a two-tiered bus option, which could have more substantial budget implications.
“The community shows a greater interest in two-tier option than they did in a three-tier option,” he said. “The two-tier model allows us to eliminate that 7:30 start time rather than just assign it to a different group of children. I think it is a more nuanced solution.”
Ensuring public support and investigating more details also encouraged the Board of Education to take more time on the start time issue, according to Freeman.
“I believe this community is going to need more time to discuss and debate and digest changes of this magnitude before they are going to feel ready to make a change like this,” he said.