The Plympton School Committee met on Monday, Feb. 26. Chair of the Plympton School Committee Jason Fraser acknowledged previous Committee Chair Jon Wilhelmsen and Food Services Director Megan Ahrenolz in the audience.
Director of Finance and Operations Sarah Hickey provided a financial report which Fraser said might inform some of the conversations that would take place later about the budget. “There are deficits in special education transportation, tuition, and contracted services,” Hickey said. “The budget for FY25 takes this into consideration. The Special Education Department is currently working on filing a Circuit Breaker Extraordinary Relief claim with the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education which if approved will offset this cost, but at this time I recommend that the Committee puts in a budget freeze for the remainder of the 2023-2024 school year,” Hickey continued. Superintendent Jill Proulx said that she was also in agreement. “Since last month, that overall function line went from a positive $209,000 to a negative $15,000; what occurred in one month to change these numbers so drastically?” Fraser asked. Proulx said that it was their understanding that payments were updated to reflect “multiple areas.” Hickey said when all was said and done by the end of the year they anticipated having a $215,000 deficit. There were three additional students that fell into the out-of-district special education category. Fraser noted that this was two years in a row that they were facing this situation with a deficit of $300,000 last year and approximately $200,000 this year.
Proulx gave a budget presentation which she said was based on Version 2. Proulx told the Committee that changes for FY25 include that Pre-K and out of district special education tuitions for Pre-K and Grades 7-12 are now Silver Lake expenses per the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE). Shared-cost positions will now be paid according to regional agreement percentages. The extended school year will now be paid out of each school’s budget, where last year it was paid out of a revolving account.
Proulx also covered the impact of special education costs. Plympton’s portion of the programmatic budget of Pre-K, including renting the building space, is $293,833. “If these tuitions were to remain in the Plympton budget; they can’t, but let’s say that they did, it would cost Plympton $617,315,” Proulx said. She continued, “anticipated transportation for FY25 would be $167,878… something to keep in mind, Circuit Breaker in FY26 for out-of-district tuition and secondary and Pre-K will go to Silver Lake in the future, but for FY25 Plympton is able to spend the entirety of Circuit Breaker on Plympton. Circuit Breaker is the Massachusetts program that provides reimbursement to public schools to aid in special education costs.
Increases to the Plympton budget also include two new paraprofessionals at $56,000 and a shared curriculum coordinator at $15,993. Extended school year costs are estimated at around $65,507 for 31 eligible students. Decreases to the Plympton budget include $1,079,026. The money that previously would have been a Plympton expense is now a Silver Lake expense per the DESE requirements. Fraser said that he was confused how $1 million was taken away from the budget but $800,000 was added back in which amounted to a 25 percent increase over the previous year. “So the FY24 budget… the forecast was low at $625,000, just in tuitions alone,” Proulx said, referring to special education tuition. She continued, “the forecast, again, was below what we are currently spending. In FY24, currently we are at about $1 million and we only forecast for $625,000, so that’s $400,000 there.” Fraser clarified saying that the mistake in last year’s budget resulted in the issues being seen now and Proulx confirmed. Committee member Dan Cadogan asked how the forecasts were so far off and Proulx answered that they have since realized where their mistakes were in anticipating costs. She also acknowledged that changing needs of the students themselves, as well as increases in costs, have also played a part.
Hickey also went over changes from the Version 1 to the Version 2 budget. She noted that she had previously had a teacher double counted in the teacher salary line. A Circuit Breaker estimation was also added into this version with a savings of approximately $700,000.
“I need to make the Silver Lake budget and the Plympton budget work together,” Fraser said. “I can’t look at either one of them in isolation because I have to send both of them to the same voters and the same taxpayers… I basically want to see us get as deep into the negatives as possible without hurting the school that I’ve worked for 11 years get where it’s at,” Fraser continued. He noted that they were still looking at an increase to Plympton’s budget of $700,000. “Which alone, is a 5.4 percent increase to my town’s budget without a single other penny being spent on another department – Police, Fire, Highway, anything else, and we had a substantial increase last year,” he said.
Proulx said that the regular day budget reflects an 11 percent increase, special education reflects a 38 percent decrease, substitutes are level funded, utilities have been increased by 5 percent, and shared costs are included but not updated to reflect any potential changes. The total budget is a decrease of 4 percent. Fraser asked if they had realized any savings from the solar panels in the utilities. Hickey said that she wasn’t able to answer that question just yet due to some outstanding and confusing Eversource bills.
Fraser said that he would like to see the Administration come up with four tiers of cuts, each consisting of $40,000. The Committee agreed that they were hopeful that those cuts would not come to be, but all felt that it was necessary that they review them at their next meeting.
Proulx told the Committee that not included in the budget was any additional staffing or potential kindergarten enrollment increases. “English language learner needs, since the last time we met, we got feedback from our English language teacher who helped provide services to our students here. Plympton currently reimburses Kingston about $2,000 per year; the issue is that Kingston needs this person to be full-time. Both Halifax and Plympton have seen an increase in needs that Kingston can no longer provide services for because they’ve had such an increase in needs as well. … we’re recommending a 0.5, part-time English language-learner person here,” Proulx said. She said that they felt that if Halifax and Plympton went in on a teacher together, they would be better off as it would then become a full-time position. Fraser asked if a comparison could be brought to the Committee to show the difference between contracted services versus a full-time employee with benefits. “I need to show due diligence and a cost comparison to the Finance Committee to show why we’re asking for this,” Fraser said.
Hickey shared with the Committee the draft assessments for each of the towns for Silver Lake. She also shared the percent increase to each of the towns’ overall operating budgets. Fraser reiterated that the schools’ budgets in Plympton represented a 5.4 percent increase to the town’s overall operating budget and a dollar amount of $700,000. “Again, trying to figure out how we can get that number smaller and figure out how the town can afford this, is really the next step,” Fraser said. Plympton’s share of the Silver Lake assessment was shared to be roughly 11 percent.
“We will continue to look at ways to possibly refine our estimates and continue to look for areas where we may be able to save some money,” Proulx said of the budgets. Fraser said, “We have benefitted greatly over the past three fiscal cycles from additional Chapter 70 funding from the State and this year the trend continues. We were at about $750,000 back in FY22 and looking forward to FY25, we have an annual increase from the State of $164,000 net of receipts for Chapter 70 for the local budget here in Plympton… another piece of the puzzle to help the town wrap their arms around and their heads around.” He noted that it wasn’t included in the schools’ budgets as the money goes directly to the towns.
Proulx said, “We have confirmed through the Department of Education that we can continue to operate food services through the revolving account provided that the Silver Lake School Committee votes to continue that practice under the USDA which is different than the other reasons why we’re untangling financial responsibilities for the upcoming school year… if it is voted by the Silver Lake School Committee it would mean that the cafeteria workers will remain Silver Lake employees as well.”
Fraser addressed that the rules prohibiting dogs from the Dennett Elementary School fields hasn’t seemed to reduce the amount of dog waste. He said that a larger conversation would likely be necessary with the Selectmen. “It seems like we almost are punishing the good dog owners in town by not allowing them to use the fields responsibly,” Fraser said.
Hickey provided an update about getting a certified safety inspection of the playground done. She said that a quote from the vendor for a few thousand dollars was expected soon. The inspection process for the rubberized surface can only be done once the exact specifications for installation are provided or it would result in an automatic fail. She also noted that the surface needs to be above 32 degrees to do the test. Additionally, the playground must be closed for two days to complete the inspection.