e e e e e e e e e e open public meetings act this public hearing on the school budget is called to order please be advised that add that the public hearing date together with a copy of the 2425 budget was advertised and printed in the Jersey journal on April 25th 2024 copy of the budget has been posted on the district website notice of the meeting was also printed in the Jersey journal and the Star Ledger and filed with the office of the town clerk by letter dated April 4th 2024 roll call Dr boy here M here Mr Carri here M Lind fer here Mr Mna here M pedig Mr Suarez here [Music] here [Music] yes I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the repblic for it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all so I think that I'm going to have the board chair 2425 school budget if there are any questions I will no [Music] all right so thank you everybody today I'm going to present the 2425 school budget first we'll talk a little bit more about how we develop the budget uh when we first look at the revenues for the school budget we look at the two main sources of revenue we get the regular state aid as well as the local tax levy then we look at any other sources of revenue that we can collect which is mostly interest rent of our facilities or any tuitions that we could do from many of the uh nearby uh board events when we look at our uh Appropriations we look at our contracts we look at any additional staff that we're looking to hire we look at our benefits we look at our educational programs and then we also look at our Maintenance and Facilities when we look at the uh the history of our enrollments um for the October of 2023 we have 5,716 students that brings us to about the same number of students that we have on the uh as of October of 2019 so we see the uptrend again of our students coming back up when we dive into our revenues um our 24 425 tax levy is going to be 59 m386 610 which is a 2% increase our regular state aid is going to be 81 m533 78 which is an increase of 12, 368,000 our miscellaneous is going to be about 1, 41,42 which consists of the interest the tuition in any of the rents our budget and fund balance is going to be 74,75 uh we are going to withdraw money from our capital reserve for about 7,645 th000 this is going to be for our Washington HVAC as well as for the lease purchase that we have for Roosevelt and Franklin HVAC our prior year incumbrances um it's a little bit diff difficult to understand that it's going to be down $2 million but this is for purchase orders that we commit from the prior year that we don't receive during the year that we have to we have to um allocated in the next year so we don't know what we're going to commit this year that we won't receive so we don't so that's why it's zero so it brings our operating budget to 149 mil 21,8 3 which is an increase of 17 m783 193 when we look at at our special Revenue Grant uh fund our local sources which consists of our uh Student Activity and scholarships is going to be $500,000 for the year our state grants is going to be 8,918 67 uh that consists of our prek program and our uh school-based youth services our federal grants is going to be 3,647 945 you'll see a huge decrease for the federal grants and that's because we're not going to have any more of the ARP and Co relief funds that we receiv received during the prior years during you also see a line here that for prek that's because we get uh additional Aid we don't get additional Aid we get the aid for the prek for the the our students special educational for the prek in a separate category so the state wants us to uh physically transfer those funds to the prek so our total special Revenue um budget for the 2425 school year will be 13 m797 357 when we look at our Debt Service uh for the 2425 school year will be 222,00 which brings our total budget to 163 m 221,00 960 when we look at our Appropriations our educational programs are going to be 69 m968 20116 our Administration is going to be 11,254 1870 our Maintenance and Facilities are going to be $6 M 6761 190 our transportation will be 3 M [Music] 500,0 our employee benefits 23, 96266 our Capital outlay which is our capital projects will be 12,658 our adult school program will be 110,000 and our Charter School payments will be$ 11 m730 70 bringing again our general fund total to 49,28334 412 our federal grants are 3,647 n45 which brings our special Revenue uh fund to 13,796 3 57 when we look at our debt fund our principle of the bonds are 210,000 for the year and the interest in our bonds are 12,800 uh the last payment that the district is going to have on the debt will be July of 2025 so there will not um so the district is going to be within the next year it's not going to have any more debt the total budget for the 2425 school year again is going to be 163 m221 960 this just now breaks up our Revenue into different categories our tax L is 36% of our budget and our state aid takes 50% of our budget when we look at our Appropriations we see that the educational programs take 43% of our uh of our budget employee benefits take 15% of our budget then our Mains and Facilities take 10% with the administration Capital Alle and Charter School both taken about 7% of our budgets when we do the expense summary our general fund will be 149 M21 803 our special Revenue fund 13 milon 797 357 and our debt fund will be 222,00 again bringing our our total budget to 163 m221 n6 60 uh this chart shows us uh as as most of us are known the district has been underfunded for over a decade now as you see in in the 16 17 school year the district was underfunded for over $20 million and you can see over the years the district was has been brought up to almost to an adequate budget uh but as you can see for the 20 for the current year 23 24 school year and 24 25 school year we're still considered underfunded School uh budget with just over uh underfunded over $5 million uh for the 2425 tax impact our calendar year tax levy is going to be 59 m694i with a tax rate of 5124 for the average $100,000 home with uh the 2024 School tax rate will be 5,124 which really which brings it for the average home uh average home value or the average home $16 an increase of $16 and those numbers were provided by the tax collector that's really all I have if anybody has any [Music] questions okay everybody could come back so [Music] [Music] [Music] we were trying to give you so you don't have to do around I e you know this better be a good question oh no no do you want me to ask yes no you're a board member you do what you here's the question Anonymous we got we got 12 million more in state aid why are we raising the tax levy by 1.1 [Music] million you asking I'm asking as a board member for my anonymous source I think that um I yeah that um with the with our enrollments continueing to increase over the years we're going to have to we we have to um make sure that we have enough funds available for any future plans that we have to do to accommodate the Dem the enrollments in the future as well as where I you know would make sure that we have enough funds to any other projects that [Music] want I have a question the district pays in part for health care for health enties and do you anticipate that the cost is going to continue rising or will it stabilize so as of right now our insurance broker has told us to uh toy budget an decrease for the 2425 school year but nothing has been finalized yet what the rates are going to be but they did T at least budget and there's no guarantee of the state aid amount from year to year as well so we need to anticipate all of that and make sure that we have a healthy cushion and we're still under funded by at least 5 million so you know until such time where we're fully funded I just not too yeah it's a lot better than it's been in a long time but it's still still not enough one is there a recommended Surplus for a district our size and are we active Sur um it all depends on what our Long Reach facility plan is um it's not really uh you know 10% of what your fund is just what type of projects a district have that you have to do so it's not really you have to have 20% in your reserves it's just District by district and what's the the taxpayer relief that we're that the boards are supposed to put in if they have more than excess in reserve 2% okay are we at that we're right now we're at the 2% okay so if it goes more than 2% then you have to give back if we have more than 2% of our extra we have to back to back to the [Music] town I noticed on the chart that the our March towards fully funding went a little closer like two years ago like looking 2022 2023 we got really close to almost full funding cuz the co that funding I think and now we drop back again I mean we're still much better than we were 10 years ago but I I was hoping that we would always go closer to any reason that we dropped you know instead of like 2 million underfunded now we're back to five that cany the formula for the state it's so really in enrollment so you know it's just so like the district enrollment went down so like tremendously like 200 students L during that time that the formula you see that we were almost there but then we started to gain students back out that and you see that like because remember the the Money Follows the kids so like the more students we have you can see that that we're back to like starting to be where the the enrollment are that we were back in the you know 1819 it's a huge we definitely made an improvement over the years right wasn't our increase in kids like over two was it 200 or we we over in one year we gained 2 yeah that's what I thought okay so we gained what we lost in two years in one year right so that's you know but it's but again the formula doesn't the the chart doesn't show it like that but it's really the the increase of that justes the co funding that we're now losing factor into that underfunded no that's different okay are we finished with the co funding or we still have some we still [Laughter] utilizing anybody else have questions for [Music] one okay motion to approve second discussion roll call Dr Bo yes Mr B yes Mr car yes M yes Mr yes Mr mrz yes mrus yes president Paris [Laughter] yes motion to Second all in favor by