Budget Crunch
Loss Of Sports Dominates Newfound Budget Hearing
BRISTOL — Residents attending the Newfound Area School District Budget Committee hearing on January 12 expressed little support for the extra-curricular activities being eliminated to meet the conditions of the district’s two-percent tax cap on assessments to the member towns. To remain within the cap, the district is required to reduce its originally proposed budget by $2.3 million, which also means forgoing new positions and withholding raises for administrators and support staff.
The original budget called for $29,299,199 in spending, an increase of $3,282,900 from the current-year budget. To remain within the tax cap, the budget had to be reduced to $26,967,729.
Superintendent Paul Hoiriis said, “When we presented this to both bodies — the budget committee and the [school] board, we asked for some guidance. They provided some guidance, but also asked us to go back to the administrative teams and talk about, where are we going to find these cuts?”
He said the first reduction was in the new positions the district wanted to hire, including currently unfilled positions: a high school math teacher and a special education case manager at the high school. They also cut five support staff positions for the middle and high school, of which 3.5 are currently unfilled.
Beyond those reductions, Hoiriis said they eliminated a math position at the middle school, a literacy position at the middle school, a replacement for a retiring French teacher at the high school, an English position at the high school, a part-time special education case manager at the middle school, and one of two ICT positions serving as both a technology teacher and librarian at the three in-district elementary school and the Bridgewater-Hebron Village School in the Pasquaney School District. (Pasquaney reimburses Newfound toward the salary and benefits.)
The stipends for those performing duties such as department head, as well as all administrative and program manager raises, also were eliminated.
The biggest impact is the total elimination of funding for extra-curricular activities, and that generated the most contentious discussion at the budget hearing.