Draft $106M OJR schools budget calls for 2.55% tax hike

The first draft of the $106 million Owen J. Roberts schools budget for the coming school year calls for a tax hike of 2.5 percent.

The school board is scheduled to vote on the preliminary budget — the first of many votes before it is finally adopted in June — at a special meeting at 6 p.m. on Monday, Feb. 12, at the French Creek Elementary School.

The next budget vote — when information is much more up to date, is likely to occur in April or May, said Jacline Krumrine, the district’s chief financial officer.

She confirmed the preliminary budget calls for $106,105,820 in revenues and $106,739,176 in expenditures.

The state tax cap for the district, called “the Act 1 index” will not allow for a tax hike larger than 2.4 percent without voter approval.

However, Krumrine said the budget, which was recommended by the finance committee, calls for a tax hike of 2.55 percent.

If necessary, the district plans on using two “exceptions” for which the state allows a district to exceed its index — pension costs and special education costs.

“Special education costs are becoming one of the drivers of our budget,” Krumrine said.

Krumrine said after years of double-digit increases, the district’s share of pension rates are finally starting to level out.

“I feel like this is the first year we’re starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel,” she said.

“For the past 10 years, we’ve struggled to keep our increases small and stay within the index while these large pension increases were coming through,” Krumrine said. “That was James Frees’s mantra, slow and steady,” she said in reference to the finance committee chairman who died suddenly Thursday.

By way of example, she noted that the current year’s budget required taking $2 million out of a special reserve fund set up to deal with the pension hikes, but the draft budget for the next school year only calls for $633,000.

“Also, enrollment will be an issue for us this year. the sixth grade class coming to the middle school is going to require adding an entire additional team, so we’re going to have some staffing challenges,” she said.

As it stands, the budget calls for raising the current millage from 30.505 mills to 31.282 mills.