CRCS Starts Closing Budget Gap

By Joshua Walther

COBLESKILL - On Monday evening, the CRCS Board of Education held their second draft budget presentation, focusing on the dwindling yet still sizable budget gap.

Last month, on January 27th, the first draft of the upcoming budget held a negative gap of $1,858,641, which factored in the estimated salaries and benefits, as well as estimated increases from BOCES and the purchase of four new buses.

The district had also planned to lower their fund balance allocation by $250,000, as the creeping reliance on their fund balance is becoming an annual issue that may lead to larger problems in the future.

However, after just a couple weeks of readjusting revenues and expenditures and calculating the tax levy limit, the gap has nearly been cut in half.

For comparison, the expenditure summary from last year’s adopted budget to this second draft stands at an increase of $2.1 million, or a 4.6% increase.

This larger number is made up from a 4% increase in administration, a 4% increase in instruction, a 3.1% decrease in transportation, and a 7% increase in benefits and debt service transfers.

On the other side of the coin, the revenue summary has seen a total increase of approximately $1 million for a 2.2% increase, made up of a 2.1% increase from local sources, a 2.6% increase in state and federal sources, and an allowable increase of the tax levy by 2.55%.

With these new figures, the total budget gap for the second draft stands at $1,099,434, but it stands to be lowered further depending on action from the Board, as Superintendent Matthew Sickles identified and proposed several additions and reductions for the district.

Although the budget gap is not closed, Superintendent Sickles has vouched that the additions, namely a new registered nurse, school psychologist, and a school resource officer, are valuable and almost non-negotiable for the health of the student body, with their total cost standing at $291,100.

To balance this, he has suggested reducing an extra Ryder class section, a vacant speech language pathologist position, a retired special education teacher, a least senior librarian, a least senior art teacher, and three retired teaching assistant positions, for a total of $522,500.

“None of this has anything to do with the job anyone is doing,” said Superintendent Sickles on the two staffing cuts. “Everyone is doing a great job.”

If the Board approves these proposals, the district would be looking at extra savings of $231,400, which would cut down the gap to $868,034.

When the presentation concluded, the Board felt the tension of the budget gap as much as anyone else. “I have a huge pit in my gut right now,” said President Bruce Tryon, who stated his fears on finding the remaining money in less than a month.

Superintendent Sickles stated that he would begin looking at additional areas for reductions, such as materials and supplies, district communications, and student activities with the lowest participation, and present another budget report next month.