Seymour School Board Approves New Budget, Which Now Heads To The Board Of Finance

SEYMOUR — The Board of Education on Monday unanimously approved a $35.5 million budget for the 2021 – 2022 school year.

The budget represents an increase of $882,568, or 2.6 percent, over the current $34.6 million budget.

The budget now heads to the town’s Board of Finance for a review. Residents will get the final say on both the town and school budgets at the annual budget referendum later this spring — assuming COVID-19 restrictions don’t preclude the public vote from happening.

Superintendent of Schools Michael Wilson actually unveiled his budget proposal to the school board last week, but at a bigger bottom-line increase that board members weren’t comfortable with.

Wilson’s initial proposal represented an increase of $1.4 million, or 4.9 percent, over the 2019 – 2020 budget. 

That version contained several new initiatives, including a full-time nurse floater position, a special education teacher and four paraprofessionals for Seymour High School, changing the music teacher’s position at SHS to full-time, four permanent building substitutes, a library media specialist to be split between SHS and Seymour Middle School, and some new instructional learning supplies to enhance curriculum at the elementary schools.

Board members said the 4.9 percent increase wouldn’t fly with voters, and directed Wilson to go back to the drawing board.

“I have serious reservations about being granted a 4.9 percent increase, and if we have any significant increase. I can’t imagine given the current circumstances with the COVID pandemic that we see an approval,” board member Jim Garofolo said.

Board member Fred Stanek concurred.

“I agree with my fellow board members that there’s no way this budget (at 4.9 percent) will get passed by the Board of Finance,” Stanek said. ​“We should ask for somewhere in the low 3 percent range. I think we’re asking for too much.”

Wilson said at last week’s meeting he met with each of the schools’ administrators who came in with ​“fiscally responsible” requests aimed at moving the district forward.

“We didn’t feel coming in any lower would be the responsible thing for us to do … and this meets the needs of our students,” Wilson said last week. ​“We understand a 4 percent increase is high but, in doing our due diligence as administrators, we felt it was appropriate.”

However, since the board asked Wilson (and School Business Manager Sherry Holmes) to take another look at the initial proposal, they scaled back some of the new initiatives.

The items that failed to make the cut include the permanent building subs, two paraprofessionals, the library media specialist and some instructional learning supplies. 

The board was adamant about keeping the nurse floater position in, especially with the pandemic still raging. A new special education teacher and two paraprofessionals for SHS were also spared, along with addition of a part-time English Language Arts teacher, and making the music teacher’s position nearly full time at SHS.

The budget also takes into account a 9.5 percent spike in employee health insurance and the usual culprits driving the annual increase — contractual obligations (salary increases included) and benefits, according to Wilson.

“This 2.55 percent increase is the absolute lowest that we can go without having to cut teachers or examining things like athletic fees, which are things that would not be good for our students,” Wilson said. ​“We feel that this number represents a fiscally responsible budget increase while still being able to provide for the learning needs of all of our students.”

Holmes said further reducing the proposal was tough.

“We got it down to a 2.55 percent increase, but all these things come at a cost,” she said, ​“We don’t necessarily like this, but we did the best we could to make some sacrifices.”

While the current budget is only about 59 percent expended, Wilson said if there’s money left over at the end of the current fiscal year, which he said there should likely be, some of the eliminated items could be added back into the new budget.

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