BOE adopts proposed budget for 2023-24 school year

The Warwick Valley Central School District board adopted the superintendent’s proposed budget and property tax report card for the coming school year at its regular monthly meeting on April 20.

The district’s proposed budget for 2023-24 comes in at $109,140,179, an increase of $7,410,940 from the current year. WV’s revenues are projected to be $109,140,179, meaning that the district is neither experiencing a surplus nor facing a shortfall.

Currently, the tax levy increase is 0.73 percent, which falls below the maximum tax levy of 4.47 percent, according to Superintendent of Schools Dr. David Leach, as he offered residents the second-to-last look at the numbers before the upcoming vote on May 16.

In order to replace some of its aging fleet, the district is also looking to buy five school buses, at a maximum cost of $830,000, combining a maximum of $330,000 from the capital bus reserve with aid from New York State, thereby minimizing the impact to taxpayers.

As of press time, the district is still waiting for the As the state legislature and Gov. Kathy Hochul just finalized the state budget, the district should soon know the amount of New York State aid that it will receive.

There are also six candidates running for three seats on the school board: incumbents John Garcia, Bob Howe, and Dory Masefield, along with challengers Luis Abramson, Angel Maysonet, and Adrienne Tveter.

‘Three-part budget’ costs

The three main components of the budget are program costs, administrative costs, and capital costs.

Program costs include teachers, aides, monitors, nurses, and staff salaries and benefits; library costs; transportation; co-curricular programs, and inter-scholastic athletics. This portion of the budget is $86,417,528 - an increase of $5,787,039 over the current school year.

Administrative costs cover salaries and benefits of professional staff who “spend more than 50% or more of their time in administration, finance and supervision.” This part of the budget also covers clerical workers, public information, curriculum development and supervision, research, legal planning and evaluation, legal services, and school board-related costs. This year, that comes to $11,853,809, an increase of $1,459,486 over the current year.

Capital costs are budgeted capital projects, maintenance, security, tax refunds, principal and interest on debt and installment purchases and leases. They are budgeted at $10,868,842, an increase of $164,415 over the current school year.

Revenues

The three components in this section of the budget are a combination of local, state, and other sources.

Local revenue sources include real property tax; interest earnings; rentals of district properties; Medicaid; refunds of prior years’ expense; among others. For the proposed budget, that comes to $4,101,275 – a $211,348 increase over the current year.

Those district property rentals are what have helped the district maintain its academic program, according to Leach.

State funding accounts for nearly a third of the district’s revenues, and comes to $35,897,941, or nearly $5 million more than the current year’s budget.

Other sources of revenue for the school district include appropriated fund balance; interfund transfers; appropriated Unemployment; appropriated Workers Compensation; debt service, among others.

Proposed expenditures

The school administration proposes spending $9,986,679 on general support items, including Board of Education; central administration; finance; and central services.

Instruction – which accounts for nearly 59 percent of the proposed budget – has a line item of $64,302,445, or a $4,411,274 increase over the current year.

Benefits and debt service are the second-largest expenditure in the budget, at $29,104,882, or an increase of $1,059,150.

The superintendent reminded those in attendance that these are worthwhile investments, as the WVCSD boasts an “impressive” five-year graduation rate of 97%– the district is number one in the region overall, and number three when compared with other New York school districts of comparable size.

Leach added that, while school enrollment has declined overall in Orange County, it has increased by about 550 children in Warwick Valley. He added that out-of-district students who pay tuition to the district “have allowed us to build program and enhance opportunities” for students, without increasing the tax levy.

Tax levy recent history

For the period of 2012-2013 through 2023-2024, the district has stayed below the New York State mandated tax cap.

“Of the 12 years since the tax cap was enacted by the state, the district has reduced the tax levy even further in eight of those years (2013-14; 2014-15; 2016-17; 2018-19 through 2021-22; and the proposed budget for 2023-24), saving taxpayers millions of dollars,” he said.