A screen shot from the April 25 meeting of the Derby Board of Apportionment and Taxation.
DERBY — The city’s tax board adopted a preliminary budget on Monday that does not raise taxes.
Officials said a public hearing on the budget is scheduled for 6 p.m Wednesday (April 26) on Zoom. Visit the City of Derby’s meeting calendar for the agenda and information needed to access the meeting on Zoom.
The Process
In Derby, the tax board (its formal name is the Derby Board of Apportionment and Taxation) approves a budget each year. It is an elected board.
The tax board has until Friday (April 29) to adopt a final budget for the fiscal year starting July 1, 2022.
The preliminary budget totals $48,385,128. Members of the tax board said the preliminary budget does not change the current mill rate. The current mill rate is 38.6, according to the City of Derby website.
There are still a few items up in the air in the budget. Members of the tax board have the opportunity to make changes to the budget after the public hearing.
School Funding
The preliminary budget allocates an additional $100,000 for Derby Public Schools, bringing the total preliminary school budget to $19,177,364.
The school board had asked for an increase of $913,805, citing union contracts and past years of flat-funding education in Derby.
During Monday’s tax board meeting, Derby Public Schools Superintendent Matthew Conway said projected insurance costs for next year have been revised and are now coming in at $72,000 lower than presented in the preliminary budget.
Jeffrey Polis, the chairman of the tax board, said he would attempt to verify Conway’s information with Mayor Rich Dziekan’s administration. If verified, the tax board could consider allocating an additional $72,000 to the school district, in addition to the $100,000 approved Monday.
More Money For Schools?
Tax board member Jennifer Desroches asked whether some of the money the Dziekan administration set aside in the budget’s special working balance could be used for education. Desroches mentioned page 23 of Derby’s submission to the state’s Municipal Finance Advisory Council, where the administration mentions finally purchasing new financial software.
Derby appears in front of MFAC because of long-standing financial issues pointed out in annual audits. MFAC members have pointed out that the city needs the new software, but at the most recent meeting questioned whether Derby is ready to use it given the lack of staff in the city’s finance department.
Polis said he would relay Desroches’ questions to the Dziekan administration. Desroches noted neither the mayor nor his chief of staff have been regularly attending Derby’s tax board meetings, and the finance director has been on paid administrative leave for almost two months.
‘Alliance District’ Funding Debated Again
Tax board member Mike Gray pointed out that Mayor’s Dziekan’s budget, which was used as the source document for the tax board’s preliminary budget, essentially fully funds all department requests for money except for the school district. He pointed out the city was in the bad position of not giving the schools enough money to pay for previously-approved employee contracts.
The mayor’s budget had allocated an additional $60,000 for schools next year. The tax board’s preliminary budget added an additional $40,000 to the mayor’s recommendation for education funding.
Gray warned against the practice of using “alliance district” money for the school district’s operating costs. Derby schools started receiving extra state aid in 2012 because it was a poor community with under-performing schools.
When the state department of education created the program, state officials explicitly said the money was to be used for school-reform programs, and was not to be used to replace local funding for normal operating costs.
Former Mayor Tony Staffieri and former school Superintendent Stephen Tracy debated the program when it was first introduced 10 years ago.
The alliance district funding was also part of the reason Ansonia Public Schools sued the City of Ansonia in 2018.
Derby Storm Ambulance asked for an increase of $150,000. The preliminary budget allocates $125,000 for the Storms, and puts $25,000 in another account that the ambulance service can access if needed.
