For the past two years, the Mascenic Regional School District has operated under a default budget. This occurs when the proposed budget is voted down by New Ipswich and Greenville residents, forcing the district to rely on the prior year’s operating budget—adjusted only for legally mandated obligations, such as debt service and existing contracts as well as one-time purchases. After two years in a default, we are in the position of having to continually play catch-up.
Our proposed budget is $23,899,107, roughly an 8.75% increase over last year’s default budget. Despite the significant increase, there is no lavish spending in this proposed budget. The bulk of this increase is due to employee salary and benefit increases, with a large majority being due to collective bargaining agreements already approved by the voters in prior years. Staff receive contracted increases or a small cost-of-living increase, and like many municipalities across the state, we were hit with a sizable increase in our health insurance rates. Additionally, we have aging facilities that require resources to maintain basic building safety standards. With the ongoing debate on open enrollment still in flux, we put in a placeholder to provide the district with some coverage in the event that our warrant article doesn’t pass or the state mandates open enrollment.
The proposed budget simply maintains our current programming with the exception of adding a required Special Education Lifeskills Program at the high school. We have students to whom we are legally required to provide services for beyond graduation, and it is more beneficial, both for student progress and fiscal responsibility, for our students to be in our community with their peers rather than tuition and transport students into another program. This program could also be an opportunity for revenue as other districts could send students to our program.
Our default budget is $23,431,429, which is $467,678 less than our proposed budget. While the impact of the last two default budgets has been somewhat mitigated by eliminating already vacant positions, we have reached a critical point where no such vacancies remain in our general fund. Consequently, any further budgetary shortfalls will directly affect our students.
In response to the challenging climate surrounding public school funding, our administrative team has proactively identified ways to meet another default budget with the least possible disruption to academic progress. However, should a default occur, in addition to supply lines being reduced, the following position/program reductions would be necessary:
- Preschool Programming: The 3-year-old preschool program at Highbridge Hill Elementary School would be eliminated, shifting from a full-day program to a service-only model.
- Elementary Staffing: Eliminating a third-grade teaching position would increase class sizes to 21–22 students. This follows last year’s reduction of a second-grade position, which will already cause next year’s second-grade classes to jump from 15–16 students to 20–21 students, exceeding the state average.
- Middle School Staffing: Eliminating a middle school teaching position would increase 7th and 8th-grade class sizes from 16–17 students to 21–23 students, which is also above the state average.
- Extracurriculars: All middle school extracurricular programs in the general fund budget would be eliminated. The most significant impact would be on athletics; the district would petition for seventh and eighth graders to compete at the high school level, while fifth and sixth graders would have to rely on the community Parks and Recreation programs.
Transparency through this budget process has been and continues to be a top priority. We want our community to understand exactly where these cuts will fall and how much they will impact the tax rates before any ballots are cast at the polls. For a property assessed at $350,000, the difference in tax impact between the proposed and default budgets is approximately $12.50 per month in New Ipswich and $14.30 per month in Greenville. Ultimately, our residents face the difficult task of deciding if the $12–$15 monthly difference outweighs the educational and extracurricular reductions outlined above.
We have been accused of not being good stewards of the taxpayers’ money, with some individuals claiming that our test scores do not warrant support of the proposed budget. However, slowly, we are making headway, and the surest way to halt progress is to reduce resources. If higher test scores and student achievement are the primary goals, a lower budget is not the answer.
Liz Pogorzelski is the superintendent of the Mascenic Regional School District. Rachel Anderson is the business administrator for the Mascenic Regional School District.