At its March 5 meeting, the majority of Region 4 (R4) Board of Education (BOE) members voted to move the proposed R4 fiscal year 2020–’21 budget, which covers the district’s middle and high schools, to a public hearing on April 1. The proposed R4 budget, at $21,163,741 represents a $591,067 or 2.87 percent increase from current spending.

The bulk of the $21,163,741 R4 budget, 50.71 percent, comprises teacher, para-educator, and coaching staff salaries, also encompassing key support staff such as secretaries, custodians, and school nurses, among others.

After salaries, the top two chunks are employee benefits at 19.42 percent, with health insurance being the highest line item, and other purchased services at 10.74 percent, with out-of-district tuition for special needs students being the highest line item.

Other main contributors to the R4 budget include debt service, professional and technical services, and purchased property services such as snowplowing and electricity, among other areas, such as supplies.

An Error in Allocation

At the meeting, Superintendent of Schools Brian White informed the BOE that inaccuracies in the data used to compute the allocations for each of the three towns (Chester, Deep River, and Essex) was discovered on March 2.

In response, the R4 budget was recalculated using accurate figures including what is paid by each town under the Supervision District budget.

The Supervision District budget, the majority of which accounts for administrative salaries and shared services and staff across the district’s four BOE budgets, was granted final approval by unanimous vote on March 3 by the Chester BOE. All other boards of education and the Supervision District Committee approved the Supervision District budget at a joint BOE meeting on Feb. 20.

“It is frustrating to be at this stage in the process and uncover this,” White said. “If [there is] any silver lining, what is going to go forward [are] good budgets.”

The inaccuracies were discovered after a request was made by a member of the R4 BOE to insert the actual number of students beside the town’s percentage on page five of the R4 fiscal year 2020–’21 budget report, which details the average daily membership (ADM).

ADM uses enrollment data based on the Connecticut State Department of Education Oct. 1 accounting of student enrollment. Students who reside in the district, but are enrolled elsewhere, at a magnet school as an example, are also counted.

As initially reported, Chester and Deep River would see their contributions to the supervision budget reduced while Essex’s contribution would rise. The corrected figures flip that scenario.

The amount of contributions assigned to Chester, Deep River, and Essex reflects an overall decline in enrollment, per calculation of the ADM, from a total of 929 students in school year 2019–’20 to 868 students projected for 2020–’21.

Chester’s ADM rose by 0.52 percent, from 23.90 percent in school year 2019–’20 to 24.42 percent projected for 2020–’21.

At a rise of 0.74 percent, Deep River saw its ADM go from 35.09 percent in school year 2019–’20 to 35.83 percent for 2020 – ‘21.

For Essex, the ADM for school year 2020–’21 is 39.75 percent, reflecting a 1.26 percent drop from the 41.01 percent ADM in school year 2019–’20.

The public hearing on the R4 BOE fiscal year 2020–’21 budget is scheduled for 7 p.m. on Wednesday, April 1 at John Winthrop Middle School, 1 Winthrop Road, Deep River. The budget will go to referendum in all three town on Tuesday, May 5.