News

June 24, 2009

Taxes the same in new NW Area budget

Consultant: Pressure to add school programs countered by the tough economic times.

IAN CAMPBELL Times Leader Correspondent

SHICKSHINNY – Northwest Area School Board members Tuesday adopted a 2009-10 budget that holds taxes at the current rate of 8.8 mills, even though pressures exist for a change.

A mill is a $1 levy on each $1,000 of assessed value, and the previous rate in the district under the old valuations was 224.5 mills.

A current mill generates $95 in taxes, and the average tax bill per residential property is $834 annually, on a property assessed at $94,755.

If residents want the district to add programs, then future planning might have to consider tax adjustments along the lines of cost of living increases, business consultant Albert Melone noted.

That said, Melone also pointed out that the current financial conditions under which so many people were suffering were not good for a school tax increase of even a small amount.

Melone presented the 2009-10 budget of $17.6 million with the bulk of the revenue, $11.1 million,coming in from state funding sources, and local sources generating $5.5 million . Federal funds provided less than $1 million.

In terms of spending, employee salary and benefits took the bulk of the budget, at over $10 million, according to the figures.

Melone noted that his figures assumed no change in teacher salaries and benefits, in part because adding an amount into the budget planning could be used as a negotiating detail for either side in the ongoing teacher contract negotiations, and that was not the purpose of the budget process.

Without changes, he indicated an estimated fund balance at the end of June 2009 of nearly $1.8 million, and by the end of June 2010 a balance of $1.7 million.

The budget called for $93,640 more in spending than in revenue, but reserves exist to cover the difference.

In other business, the board agreed to consider a proposal put forward by Shickshinny Borough to solve a potential problem affecting the playing area of the girls’ field hockey teams.

Although the area currently in use was likely to be infringed on by a planned boat launch the borough is developing with state funding, the possibility existed that the teams could be given a similar area of land near the pavilion.

Council would have to approve the offer, Mayor Beverly Moore noted, as it had only been raised as a potential solution earlier Tuesday.

Borough Council will meet Thursday, she told the board.

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