Bryce Sammel has been named chair of the Windsor Central Modified Unified Union School District Board and Pamela Fraser vice chair through March 2021.
Both board members represent Barnard in three-year terms. Sammel’s term expires in 2021. Fraser’s ends in 2022.
Monday’s reorganization followed two board resignations: former chair Patti Kuzmickas of Pomfret, and Malena Agin of Woodstock. Their positions will be filled by the Select Board from each of their towns.
Kuzmickas was elected chair on March 9, but stepped down the following day amid claims of a flawed nomination process. On March 11, she resigned from the board. Agin tendered her resignation from the board shortly afterward.
Sammel was elected chair by unanimous vote. Fraser was elected vice chair over fellow nominee Ben Ford,10-5. Ford represents Woodstock.
Fraser said she wanted to serve in the position, since “I care very much about education.”
“It’s a major part of my life and my career.
I care about public institutions and I care about fairness,” Fraser said.
By a majority vote, the board rejected a motion to do away with the vice chair position.
Banios picked by Mass. school district
On Tuesday, March 24, the Hamilton-Wenham Regional School District in Massachusetts announced they had selected Mary Beth Banios as superintendent pending successful negotiations. Banios has been superintendent of the Windsor Central Supervisory Union in Woodstock since 2017. She was among four finalists vying for the Hamilton-Wenham position.
Mary Beth Banios, superintendent of the Windsor Central Union
School District, announced that she will be leaving the district in a
letter to school board members, Wednesday, March 25.
Banios told the board that she had gotten the job as superintendent
at Hamilton-Wenham Regional School District, in Wenham, Massachusetts,
and would be starting there on July 1, 2020.
BRIDGEWATER — Two tractor-trailers crashed head-on Monday on
a snowy state highway, leaving damage to the Bridgewater Corners Store
and several parked cars, according to police. No one was injured
in the crash that happened around 5 p.m. on Route 4 by the intersection
with Route 100 in Bridgewater, according to a news release from Vermont
State Police. A truck driven by Henry Davis, 38, of Cleveland, traveled
over the center line, hitting another tractor-trailer driven by Wesley
Wheeler, 63, of Brandon, Vt., police said. Wheeler’s truck veered off the road, hitting the Bridgewater Corners Store and two unoccupied parked cars. Police
and the Bridgewater Fire Department responded to the scene and shut
down one lane of Route 4 near the crash until 8 p.m. Monday.
The Windsor Central Supervisory Union (WCSU) School Board’s newly
elected chair has abruptly resigned and two other board members
reportedly have threatened to resign following accusations and an
election process described as “mistrustful” and “flawed.”
“Effective immediately, I am stepping down as chair,” Pomfret School
Board member Patricia Kuzmickas wrote in an email that she sent to board
at 3:12 p.m. on March 10, less than 24 hours after she was elected.
“It has been expressed to me today that the process by which I was
elected has led to members of this body to doubt my integrity and to
express an inability to trust me going forward. I will not argue those
points further but please know it was not my intent.
“I
apologize for the inconvenience this has caused the board. I will put my
FULL UNQUALIFIED support behind whoever is elected by this body going
forward and hope that the important work of the board can pro-ceed to
the benefit of our students and communities,” Kuzmickas wrote. She later
submitted her resignation from the school board.
By Wednesday
afternoon, Kuzmickas’ contact information on the board’s webpage had
been removed. Her position is listed as “vacant.”
Kuzmickas’s resignation comes after the board on March 9 appointed her by a vote of 9-7 over Louis Piconi of Woodstock.
At the March 9 meeting, School Board Member Jim Haff of Killington
nominated Kuzmickas for the chair position, and School Board Member
Clare Drebitko of Woodstock nominated Piconi.
“I nominated a
person who I thought really cared about the community and the kids, and
who would run a good meeting,” Haff said in a telephone interview.
“The collective will of the board was a vote for chair. The outcome was
Patti, 9, Lou, 7. Patty had the majority vote. Then individuals went
out to confront Patti questioning the process and then questioning her
integrity. I wonder, am I missing something here?” Haff said.
Haff said that soon after the vote four board members threatened to resign if Kuzmickas did not relinquish the role.
“I think it’s sad that a few people can get to somebody and put them in
a place in which they unfortunately resign. That they felt they were
badgered and bullied. That they can’t deal with this anymore and
resign,” Haff said.
In a three-page email addressed to the board on March 10 before the resignation, Piconi congratulated Kuzmickas on her win.
“Taking on this role is not a decision to be made lightly and I respect
(Kuzmickas) for stepping up. I would be lying if I said that I am not
disappointed. I’ve spent the last 13 weeks preparing for this role,”
Piconi wrote.
He added, “As part of that effort I used my
professional and board contacts to learn more about how districts like
ours solve tough problems. Part of that work may benefit your
leadership.”
Later in the message, he said that he planned to resign following personal attacks on his character.
“Given that there seems to be a majority of board members that are
willing to criticize my character without speaking to me I will let you
know it is my intention to resign.”
Piconi said a formal letter of resignation would be submitted after his return from New York City.
In an email exchange between Woodstock board member Malena Agin and
Haff on March 10, also before Kuzmickas’ resignation, Agin wrote, “I am
suggesting this (election process) be clarified immediately because if
someone is questioning due process, then consider this my resignation
too.”
Agin, writing in the same email thread, said, “It was
Patti’s consent to Louis’ email that did it for me, Jim. Woodstock at
its worst. Lies, manipulation and deceit. They win again but I really
can’t stomach it anymore.”
Agin did not respond to an email seeking comment.
Woodstock board members Clare Drebitko and Ben
Ford did not return March 12 emails from the Standard seeking comment.
However, newly appointed board vice-chair Bryce Sammel, in an email on
March 12, confirmed that Kuzmickfall as “turned in a letter of
resignation to the district’s central office.
“Unfortunately, it
appears there have been some individuals contacting the media speaking
about interactions between specific board members that are untrue and
unsubstantiated by the people mentioned,” he added.
“The board
recognizes the many challenges it has faced and continues to face
uniting many communities and diverse priorities. It further recognizes
the need for the community to understand when information, that is not
the collective will of the board, is being offered by individuals, that
it does not represent the perspective of the mindset of the board as a
whole,” Sammel wrote.
WCSU board member Pamela Fraser of Barnard said she could address some, “but not all,” of the election controversy.
“A small group of board members were surprised that Patti was running
for chair, because she had only decided to run a few days before and
they had not heard. There was nothing improper about the voting process,
but they were unhappy with not being made aware that she would run,”
Fraser wrote in the March 12 email.
“This small group discussed
this with Patti after the meeting and the next day, and this led to
Patti’s resignation. In turn, this fact then upset other members who
believed that due process was followed and that it was wrong to question
the outcome of the vote. I personally into this latter group that feels
it was not proper to not simply accept the outcome of the vote,” Fraser
wrote.
In an email sent on March 10 to Kuzmickas, Fraser wrote:
“I am not sure I understand why a board member’s late decision to run
for chair is considered mistrustful. No one running for chair should
ever be considered inevitable, it’s an election.”
Fraser proposed that the issue be continued as an agenda item “for a meeting in the near future.”
In a letter dated March 11 to the school board, Superintendent Mary
Beth Banios described the WSCU School Board as being “at a crisis
point.”
She wrote, “With difficult decisions related to
competing priorities, potential multiple board resignations, challenges
related to board leadership etc., there is no more important time for
the board to pull together. It is a critical juncture.
“Despite
multiple attempts to resolve the board’s challenges internally, the
board must now look for external support to address this ongoing strife
and be willing to embrace commitments that must be made in this process.
“Your appointed board chair, Patti Kuzmickas, has made the decision to
resign. As the board leadership dilemma continues to evolve, I will be
working with Bryce Samuel, appointed vice chair of the board, on meeting
agendas and potential structures to assist the board in resolving the
internal challenges it is facing,” Banios said.
Windsor
Central Supervisory Union Superintendent (WCSU) Mary Beth Banios has
been named a finalist for the position of superintendent of the
Hamilton-Wenham Regional School District (HWRSD) in Massachusetts. Michelle Bailey, vice-chair of the HWRSD School Committee, confirmed
Thursday that Banios is among four finalists chosen out of a field of 22
candidates by a screening committee. The Hamilton-Wenham school district is comprised of 1,839 students in grades pre-K-12 and is located on Boston’s north shore. In a March 11 letter to WCSU School Board members, Banios announced
that she had “recently made the decision to explore returning to
Massachusetts as a superintendent.” “The decision is grounded in both personal and professional reasons,”
Banios said. “I have just learned that I will be named a finalist for
the superintendent in the Hamilton-Wenham school district in
Massachusetts and that this will become public information this
evening.” “Regardless of the outcome of my exploration of opportunities in
Massachusetts, I want to assure you that I remain committed to this
district and the students it serves for as long as I am your
superintendent.” Bailey said the HWRSD position is being advertised with a salary in
the range of $185,000 to $196,000. Banios’ current salary as WCSU
superintendent is $140,000. Bailey said her committee is expected to make a decision on the
finalists at the end of March. On Monday, two members are scheduled to
conduct a site visit of the WCSU district, she said.
On Monday, March 9, 2020 the school board attended the
re-organization meeting for the district. Two individuals were nominated for
Board Chair, Patti Kuzmickas of Pomfret and Louis Piconi of Woodstock. The
majority voted for Patti Kuzmickas. Bryce Sammel of Barnard was nominated and
voted in as Vice-Chair of the school board.
Within less than 24 hours, Patti Kuzmickas gave her notice
of resignation. A select group of board members, three Woodstock
representatives and one Pomfret representative threatened her with their
resignations from the board if she did not step down. One school board member
from Woodstock directly approached Patti Kuzmickas after the board meeting to
tell her she was not capable of leading the board. Who would blame an
individual from stepping down when this group of board members was relentless
with their mean spirited tactics? No one deserves the disrespect or the
implications that questions one’s integrity or abilities to run the board. This
practice of bullying and threatening fellow board members is unacceptable. It
only confirms the reputation that these four board members have earned through
their recent actions of bullying, and manipulation, and who will go to any
extent to push through their personal agendas. They will stop at nothing; there
will be no hesitation to close Reading Elementary and the Pomfret School in
order to build a 68 million dollar school. The other towns have always been
concerned about having six representatives from Woodstock, and here is a
perfect example.
The district deserves a chair that has integrity, who is
passionate, who will stand up and fight the fight, who will work to provide the
best education and opportunities for our all of the students, not just a select
few, who will be kind to our support staff, teachers, principals and
administration, who is open values the input from others, who will work as a
team member, and not bring personal agendas to the table and who will work for
the taxpayers.
It is time for the taxpayers to stand up and say enough is
enough. It is time for your school board to start working as a team.
The bad news is that the Windsor Central Supervisory Union (WCSU) is facing a potential FY19 budget shortfall of $200,000 to $700,000, as discovered in financial audits.
“The good news is the bleeding has stopped,” WCSU Superintendent Mary Beth Banios told members of a finance subcommittee on March 4.
In a Feb. 29 letter, Banios said that as a result of, and even before, the 2019 merger, “things have been missed.
“It was certainly a mistake on my end to not arrange for the FY18 audit presentation to the board after the previous finance director had indicated that it was complete. This would have brought to light the issue that the audit was not complete,” Banios said.
Banios said it “appears that it is likely” that past finance director Richard Seaman “made several errors when building out district budgets during his five-year tenure, both pre- and post-merger, and this may have an impact on future budgets.
“These errors have been picked up as part of the audit process and as a result of the hard work of (current finance director) Michael Concessi. Though unwelcome and challenging, these budget issues are solvable.”
The potential deficit was brought to light during a presentation from the auditor regarding the status of school district financial audits and fund balances, March 4.
The deficit situation is “fixable,” independent auditor Ron Smith of RHR Smith & Co. told members of an WSCU School Board finance subcommittee.
Smith said that in FY2016 the supervisory union had accumulated a $1.2 million budget surplus, comprised mostly of unrestricted funds.
Using a “calculated” spending plan, those funds were spent — $840,000 for tax relief in FY2017, and $439,000 to support the FY2018 budget.
Although the money had already been allocated, the WSCU finance office budgeted additional surplus funds for use in the FY19 budget, Smith said.
“That money was not there, neither was it ever transferred,” Smith said. “This is why we need to get caught up, and caught up now. Obviously, 2019 didn’t go as planned. Who paid for that? Who, what, when, where?”
Banios, at the meeting, said the potential deficit is due to “math errors” that culminated in a “perfect storm happening.”
Smith said there were “some misunderstandings” that were given the “benefit of the doubt.”
“This is all fixable. Period,” he said.
On March 23, WSCU officials and Smith will meet to discuss various options to resolve the potential deficit, Banios said.
In an email to the Vermont Standard, Banios said that “all FY19 audit reports are on track to be complete by March 31 and we fully anticipate meeting our statutory obligations of filing our WCSU FY19 audit with the state Agency of Education by March 31.”
“This is a solvable problem with a lot of potential solutions,” Banios said.
Banios explained that audit reports are produced at the supervisory union level, and for each school or district “they also receive a Letter of Acceptance by the auditor once all of the auditors’ questions have been answered.
Banios said the required WCSU FY18 audit report and Letter of Acceptance were filed on time for that fiscal year in late March 2019.
“The supporting school/district audit reports that are not required to be submitted to the state were also complete last March and books were closed, but due to some lingering questions from the auditor that had not been answered by the former finance team the Letters of Acceptance had not been issued for these reports,” Banios said in the email.
“Before moving onto the FY19 audit for this year, our new finance team had to respond to these questions in order to receive the final Letters of Acceptance for each school/district. All questions have been answered by our new finance team and now all FY18 audit reports have received their Letter of Acceptance. Different schools/district received their Letters of Acceptance at different times from October 2019 to February 2020,” Banios said.
However, unlike state numbers, “the timing and completion of an audit is something we have control over. As we continue to evolve as a new district we need to push our time lines up on the audits so that this information can inform the next year’s fiscal budget,” she said.
Banios added that, “for oversight purposes,” audit reports are typically shared with the WCSU board and the AOE. “They tend to be dense and technical documents and are not usually sent out to taxpayers. This being said, the audit reports are public documents and taxpayers can request them at any time.”
Concessi replaced Seaman as finance director for the supervisory union in November 2019.
“In light of the complexities of the (2019) merger and changing chart of accounts ... there were structural deficiencies in how the budgets in FY19 and FY20 were built, we believe we have found and correct(ed) the vast majority of these errors in the FY21 budget,” Banios said in her email.
At annual town meetings last week, voters in five of seven WCSU member towns approved a $21 million school district budget for FY21, which begins July 1. Reading and Killington rejected the budget proposal.
Killington rejected the budget proposal, 239 to 112, because many voters “did not have enough information to make an informed decision,” Killington Town Manager Chester Hagenbarth said in a letter, which he read to the WSCU School Board on March 9.
“We wonder why we’re in this hole. I’m really frustrated that there was a budget for FY21 that was passed,” said James Haff, one of Killington’s two school board members.
“If you don’t know what’s in your checking account, you don’t know what’s there is to spend in 2021,” he said.
Killington officials are calling for an immediate freeze on “all unnecessary spending” within the Windsor Central Modified Unified Union School District, which is facing a FY19 carryover budget deficit of $200,000 to $700,000, according to a financial audit.
“In addition, knowing there is only a two-year window for replenishing the fund balance, assuming the school district budget will develop the means for correction, the school district should utilize the approved spending amount and create a new line item budget for FY21 with the goal of saving the first $300,000 deficit in the first year,” Killington Town Manager Chester Hagenbarth said, reading from a letter to the Windsor Central Supervisory Union (WCSU) School Board on March 9.
Hagenbarth said Killington officials believe the deficit reduction can “easily be accomplished by eliminating all unnecessary programs and spending along with corrections to existing programs.”
Potential reductions would include eliminating teacher coaches, “as Vermont licensed teachers should not need to be retained [as coaches].” Additional reductions could include “school to work programs and ensuring that all WCSU teachers are teaching their contractually allowed five individual classes with reasonable class sizes,” he said.
Killington officials also suggested reducing the “enormous losses in the food service group, along with any other non-necessities in the school,” Hagenbarth said.
“We are not commenting on the quality of the programs, but given the financial condition of the district and the lack of capital funding, the school district needs to consider only required functions and programs and build a groundup budget that provides for required education, facilities maintenance and capital improvements to en-suite the long-term success of the district,” he said.
Carin Park, chair of Barnard Academy’s School Board, also called for greater transparency and accountability by WSCU officials.
She said in Barnard, the $21 million FY21 budget passed, “but narrowly,” and that the 1,677-1,216 vote reflected a “lack of confidence in the financial management of Unified District funds and frustration with the opacity of the budget development process.
“But generously, it also reflects a tentative trust in board representatives to spearhead the work towards change,” Park continued.
Hagenbarth, reading from a prepared statement, said Killington defeated the proposed budget 239-112, because voters “did not have enough information to make an informed decision.”
He said information provided at town meeting stated that audits for 2018 and 2019 were incomplete. Voters also balked at passage of the proposal since budget fund balances were unknown.
Another reason the budget proposal failed was that it represented an 8.5 percent increase in the tax rate for Killington, he said.
Voters in all seven towns which comprise the supervisory union have approved the merger with Barnard.
“Collectively, Barnard voters have supported a full merge with the Unified District, but it comes with the expectation that the board will provide heightened oversight of central office management of our tax dollars and increased transparency of the budget process,” Park said.
On March 4, the WSCU School Board finance subcommittee heard a status report by an independent auditor of the district‘s finances for fiscal years 2018, 2019, and 2020.
The “takeaway” from the meeting was that the FY19 carryover fund deficit, in the range of $200,000 to $700,000, is “a problem but it is an absolutely fixable problem,” board member Jennifer Iannantuoni said.
“There were things missed by the finance department and we will fix them. We have 15 months to fix them. I have a lot of confidence in the auditor,” Iannantuoni said.
Dear Editor, I was quite taken aback by the quote from Windsor Central Supervisory
Union Superintendent Mary Beth Banios in the March 4 Mountain Times in
response to Killington’s School Board Representative Jim Haff’s lobbying
Killington residents to vote “no” on a rather dubious presented (by
Banios) $21 million budget. Her quote is below: “It is unfortunate that an individual, who is also a board member,
made false and misleading claims about my performance as a
superintendent, the FY21 budget, and the financial management of the
district,” Banios said. “This individual’s comments do not represent the
position of the full board, collective finance committee, our auditor
or the current finance director. When a trusted elected official
misrepresents facts in a public meeting related to a budget, it makes
it hard for voters to make informed decisions around how their public
dollars should be spent.” Banios makes all sorts of general statements and seems to be speaking
for other school board members, finance committee members, the
independent auditor and the current finance director. First off, when did she become the spokesperson for the School Board,
the finance committee and the independent auditor? These are people and
entities which oversee her and she has no business usurping their
voice, especially when she offers no specifics as to what these supposed
misrepresentations are supposed to be. From what I have gathered regarding this budget process Banios
presented a “bottom line” budget with absolutely no line item detail and
expected the board to rubber stamp it without any review. The board’s job is to review the details of what makes up the budget,
then approve it. If they do not see the detail there is no way to
determine if management’s performance is in line with the budget. That’s
why you have a budget. Apparently Banios’s justification is she didn’t
want to go running to the board for approval of any deviations from the
budget. Well that’s why you have a budget and a board, to oversee things
and get answers to any variances in the actual spending vs. what they
approved. The board exists for that very reason. As to misrepresentations by Haff in regards to the deficits, within
two days of the budget vote the following was published in the Vermont
Standard: “An independent auditor has found a series of budgeting errors that
resulted in the Windsor Central Supervisory Union overspending anywhere
from $200,000 and $700,000 in fiscal years 2019 and 2020. WSCU
Superintendent Mary Beth Banios said Wednesday that the mistakes appear
to have been made prior to the completion of the school district merger
in 2019.” So where are these “misrepresentations?” And if you want to get into
who’s giving out misleading information, maybe Ms. Banios might want to
look in the mirror. As a $140,000 per year superintendent, the buck stops at Banios’
desk, at least it should. She is responsible for management of the
district’s spending whether or not financial responsibilities were
delegated to the so-called finance person. Apparently, at least part of
the reason the deficit(s) were not identified earlier was that millions
of dollars worth of journal entries were not posted to the accounting
system. The excuse given by the “finance person” was that he was not an
accountant. Well any “finance” person should at least have a basic
understanding of the accounting cycle or else they have no business in
finance, at least not at $110,000 per year. So let’s get some meat on those false, misleading and
misrepresentation bones so we can understand what Banios is referring
to when criticizing Haff’s doing his job. Vito Rasenas, Killington
An
independent auditor has found a series of budgeting errors that resulted
in the Windsor Central Supervisory Union overspending anywhere from
$200,000 and $700,000 in fiscal years 2019 and 2020. WSCU Superintendent Mary Beth Banios said Wednesday that the mistakes
appear to have been made prior to the completion of the school district
merger in 2019. The full impact of the financial accounting practices will be made public on March 23, Banios said. “The good news is that the (financial) bleeding has stopped ,” Banios
said during a presentation by school district auditor Ronald Smith at
Wednesday’s meeting of the WSCU School Board finance subcommittee. “This is all fixable. Period,” Smith said. Read more in the March 12 issue of the Vermont Standard.
On Tuesday, voters from the member towns of the Windsor Central Modified Unified Union District (WCMUUD) approved the merger of Barnard Academy into the district and the budget.
Article 2 called for Barnard Academy to be merged into the district. The member districts voted 2364 to 549 to approve the measure.
Article 3 addressed the school budget if the merger was approved. The budget is $21,783,948 with $16,896,833 to be raised by taxes. The expected equalized pupil spending is expected to be 2.82 percent higher than the current budget . The member districts voted 1677 to 1216 to approve the measure.
Article 4 was for the school budget if the merger was not approved, and is therefore null and void as the merger was approved by the voters.
For school board directors, Killington re-elected Jim Haff, Plymouth re-elected Jen Flaster, Pomfret re-elected Patti Kuzmickas, Reading elected Anna Sessa, and Woodstock elected Louis Piconi and Sam DiNatale.
Selectman and School District Board Member Jim Haff is asking
Windsor Central School District voters to vote “no” on the school
district budget. At Killington’s Informational Meeting, Monday, March 2, he told a
crowd of about 60 that the district administration presented voters with
a budget with no line items this year for the first time. Instead there
is “just a bottom line figure of $21 million,” he said. Adding that
it’s very difficult for the board to hold the Superintendent accountable
if the budget isn’t broken down by department (minimally). Haff said “I
will be voting ‘no’ for the first time probably ever on a school
budget.” Haff is one of two who represent Killington on the district board, he also sits on the finance committee of that board. When asked directly by a citizen if the budget problems were caused
by mismanagement, Haff said “well… yes!” Then went on to clarify that a
former district finance employee had not entered any journal entries for
2019, which has severely delayed the audit for that year. Haff said
they now expect that audit to be completed this month and are projecting
upwards of $1 million deficit. When asked why Killington’s school tax was going up 8 cents this
year, Haff explained that the school portion of the Homestead tax rate
is $1.6830 — 5.1 cents up over last year, or up 3.16%, from $1.6299 in
FY20—prior to the common level of appraisal (CLA) being factored in.
(See localized rates below). (Editor’s note: Story below was posted Jan. 22, 2020. It was
written prior to the revised student count, which necessitated
additional cuts to stay below the threshold. That story is here.) WCSD budget up, but only half of district towns will see tax hike By Polly Mikula The Windsor Central School District (WCSD) is working on a proposed
total budget of $21.9 million for FY2021, a $3.8 million increase. When local revenue sources (grants, donations, tuition, surplus) are
deducted, the budget to taxpayers comes down to $17,096,833 for FY2021,
representing a $1,293,084 increase, or 8.18% over the current FY20
budget of $15,803,749. Some of this year’s increase is a result of Barnard joining the
district, which is offset by the additional pupils the district receives
funding to educate. When the district’s 913 equalized students are divided by the
proposed net budget, WCSD education spending rate is up 4.1% or $740 per
student, at $18,733. The budget is $23 shy of the penalty phase, which begins at $18,756
per equalized pupil. After that threshold, for every additional dollar
the district would have to return a dollar to the state, so to get $1
requires $2 to be raised. The district’s 913 equalized pupils number 23 more than the prior
year. The equalized pupil tally is derived from a trailing average of
enrollment over the past three years, and is a number the board has been
trying to nail down specifically over the past few weeks, but has yet
to receive Agency of Education (AOE) approval for 913 students (Brad
James at AOE had given the district an evaluation of 903 equalized
pupils, but the district is assuming its appeal for 913 will be
accepted). The actual number of equalized pupils in the district is 881.
There are also 114 students tuitioned from other Vermont school
districts or privately funded and nine students sponsored by the
district (neither of which count toward the state’s equalized pupil
tally), for a total of 1,004 students that the district educates as of
Jan. 6, 2020, according to the Superintendent’s Report from the Jan. 13
board meeting. The district budget accounts for all costs associated with educating
students in Woodstock, Killington, Bridgewater, Pomfret, Plymouth,
Reading and Barnard, including maintaining its six school buildings: the
union middle school/high school and the SU building in Woodstock as
well as four operating elementary schools in Woodstock, Killington,
Reading and Barnard, and some costs associated with maintaining The
Prosper Valley School in Pomfret. Factor contributing to the rise $914,124 more for the FY21 Barnard Budget now brought over to the
WCSD budget (assuming voters in the district vote to accept Barnard into
WCSD on Town Meeting Day.) $529,000 more in contractual obligations. This includes $125,000 for early retirement. $425,000 more for health insurance costs. Premiums increased 12.9% statewide. $135,000 more for budget oversights from FY19 (i.e. snow removal, audit costs) $125,000 more for the building and grounds maintenance fund. If
projected increases to revenues come to fruition, the total fund could
increase to $250,000, Superintendent Mary Beth Banios told the board,
Jan. 13. Act 46 incentive dropped from $0.06 to $0.04 for FY21, as scheduled. New revenue sources $55,000 more is anticipated this year after the board voted to raise
out-of-district tuition by $500 to $18,500/student starting FY21. This
money would be put toward the building and grounds fund. $35,000 more is anticipated if a new athletic participation fee
($50/sport/student) is enacted. $20,000 of that would be applied toward
the building and grounds fund. Significant costs not included Remediation costs for the The Prosper Valley School in South Pomfret,
which the board voted to fund $200,000 forward on Jan. 13. A
presentation by Banios stated “the next phase of repair at The Prosper
Valley school be funded through the operating budget, loans, and/or
private donations.” But no adjustment has yet to be made to the budget
for FY21 to incorporate this cost. Potential surpluses or deficits from FY2019. The audit for FY2018 was
completed Jan. 10, 2020, and books and audit for FY2019 are “currently
being reviewed,” according to Banios. “We expect to close the books and
complete the audit by the end of January 2020,” but other board members
anticipate that audit won’t be complete until much later. “That’s crucial information as it could be a significant amount.
We’re looking at possibly a $100,000-plus deficit from past years and
that would put us over the spending threshold and into the penalty phase
without cuts to offset those increases,” WCSD director Jim Haff said. Localized rates The school budget portion of the Homestead tax rate is $1.6830 — 5.1
cents up over last year, or up 3.16%, from $1.6299 in FY20—prior to the
common level of appraisal (CLA) being factored in. (CLA is an assessment
from the state on each town’s property value that is intended to adjust
for accurate market values year to year.) Once CLA is factored in, some district town’s tax rates will increase ,while others will decrease.
Woodstock’s homestead tax rate will see the highest increase: 11.1
cents higher than last year with a rate of $1.7781 per $100 of property
value.
Killington follows with a 8.7-cent increase to $1.7262.
Plymouth is right behind with an 8.5-cent increase to $1.6952.
Reading will see a modest 1.1-cent increase to $1.5949.
On the other side, Pomfret will see the largest decrease: 7.6 cents off at $1.5979.
Bridgewater follows with 7.1 cents off with a rate of $1.7120.
Barnard, which just voted to join the district on Dec. 10, will see a decrease of 2.4 cents to $1.7162.
To put this in perspective, a $300,000 house in Woodstock would see a
$333 increase for the school district budget (and pay $5,334 in school
taxes) while a person in Pomfret also with a $300,000 house will save
-$228 compared to last year (and pay $4,794 in school taxes). “For those of us who live in towns where the property value is
increasing, our tax rates will be going up greater than the rates the
district has control of,” said Haff. “For those who live in towns with
declining property values, you may see a decrease in your taxes even
though the school budget is up. That’s the implication of the CLA,” he
explained. “If you look at your house as an investment, the reason why
your taxes are down is because the value of your investment has
decreased with the current CLA evaluation. On the other side, if your
taxes are going up, it’s because your house investment is now worth
more,” Haff continued. Work in progress The WCSD finance committee has a meeting Thursday, Jan. 23, and the
full district school board will meet Monday, Jan. 27, at which point
they are expected to vote on a final budget to be warned for Town
Meeting Day, March 2. However, without the FY19 audit complete to know potential carryover
deficits, the actual per pupil count confirmed by Brad James at AOE, and
a funding source for the $200,000 committed to Pomfret for
rehabilitation, many members of the board are wary of big swings in the
current budget projections — swings that could easily put the district
over the penalty threshold and significantly increase taxes levied.
