Jefferson voters will have a chance June 2 to affirm or reject a proposed $5,532,891 budget for educating its K-12 students in the 2015-2016 school year, as well as amendments to the current education budget.
The proposed budget was adopted by the town’s voters at the annual budget meeting May 19, and will ultimately be decided by a single referendum question.
The proposed budget would be an increase of $359,839 or 6.96 percent over the current year.
The relative increase would be less, however, if a proposed amendment to the current budget is also approved. The overall increase would instead be $233,222 or 4.4 percent, according to AOS 93 Superintendent Steve Bailey.
Either way, the town’s share of the budget would grow if the question is approved.
With state subsidy anticipated to decrease by $206,089 or 11.3 percent and only $10,000 in undesignated funds being used as a beginning balance (as opposed to $20,000 in the current budget), the local share of the budget would grow by $487,675 or 14.64 percent, according to budget documents.
Most of the overall budget increase is in the regular instruction and special education instruction categories, proposed at $2,215,338, up $199,552 or 9.9 percent, and $932,512, up $179,601 or 23.85 percent, respectively.
The proposal includes funds for a 6 percent tuition increase for students attending private
high schools, about $160,000 in new funding for out-of-district placements for special education students, the addition of one new regular instruction teacher, and the cut of one teaching position from the Jefferson Village School resource room, among other changes.
A separate referendum question will ask for approval of $126,616 in increases to both the regular instruction category and the overall budget for the 2014-2015 school year. Those increases were also adopted by Jefferson voters at the May 19 budget meeting.
The increase would resolve an anticipated shortfall in the regular instruction category.
Factors contributing to the shortfall include a larger private secondary school tuition rate increase than was originally budgeted for as well as an influx of students.
The current budget faced shortfalls in other budget categories as well, but those were resolved through line freezes and both committee- and voter-approved transfers between budget categories, among other steps.
The increase would be funded using nearly $30,000 in previously unanticipated revenues as well as about $97,000 of the school department’s $130,021 undesignated fund balance, according to a declaration the Jefferson School Committee approved in April.
The referendum is scheduled for Tuesday, June 2 from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. at the Jefferson Fire Station.
