With over 99 percent of its 2017-18 projected budget increases coming from health insurance, retirement contributions and collective bargaining agreements, Merrimack Valley school district is turning to legislators for help.
The district’s superintendent, Mark MacLean, said the district is even going so far as thinking of supporting a bill for a broad-based tax.
MacLean explained this and other options as he presented next year’s draft budget to select board and school board members from the school district’s five municipalities Thursday night.
The operating budget is expected to be $40.3 million, up 1.93 percent, or $761,616, from 2016-17.
Prior to MacLean even getting to those numbers, though, he explained to the room, “Recently we’ve had some efforts on behalf of the school district to illuminate what we feel are some shortfalls.”
The district sent an open letter to state legislators last month, asking that a better system be put into place than what the state currently has: property taxes as the main source of public education revenue, plus downshifting costs to the local level.
In 2012, for instance, the state’s education adequacy fund formula changed, and the stabilization program – intended for property-poor and income-strapped municipalities – began being reduced by 4 percent a year.
It will be fully eliminated in 25 years, and for Merrimack Valley, that means about $117,000 less in state aid annually.
This, Merrimack Valley school district’s open letter said, is all while the costs for students’ needs are increasing, due in large part to mental health awareness and the opioid crisis.
In that school district, for instance, the number of students enrolled decreased 8.75 percent – from 2,718 to 2,485 – over the past decade, while the district’s approved operating budget rose from $30.55 million to 39.5 million over the same time period.
Meanwhile, MacLean said the district’s per-pupil cost – $12,908.04 – is among the lowest 10 in the state.
MacLean said he has been meeting with both legislators and other school administrators around the state on the issue of inadequate funding for public education.
“What we’ve decided to focus on as an administrative group in the state of New Hampshire is bills focused on adequacy,” MacLean said. “So we can be a stronger voice than we have been in the past.”
As legislators file bill requests, MacLean said the state’s collective school administrative group expects to back one type of bill: a change to the state’s education adequacy formula, or, MacLean said with a mix of hope and hesitance, a bill for a broadbased tax that Concord Rep. Paul Henle plans to sponsor.
“I’m not sure how it will fly,” MacLean said to the Granite Staters smiling at him from around the room. “I’m new to the political realm.”
“Optimistic,” someone else responded. New Hampshire has never had a broad-based tax, and takes much pride in that fact as evidenced by its “Live Free or Die” motto.
MacLean said he is also interested in another, perhaps less controversial topic at the state level: retirement contributions. He indicated there may be a bill the school district can support that has the state go back to paying 35 percent of employers’ contributions to New Hampshire’s Retirement System. (The state currently contributes nothing).
Beyond the State House, MacLean said the school district is trying to increase revenues by, for instance, responding to Pittsfield’s request for a high school to send its students to.
“Anytime we see opportunities like that, we jump at the chance,” MacLean said.
The school district is also doing future planning, expecting to cut personnel as student enrollment decreases. It’s begun a capital improvement program as well, to keep big projects from swinging tax rates one way or the other.
If ongoing collective bargaining negotiations go well, Merrimack Valley school district business administrator Robin Heins said there are opportunities for health cost savings there too. Last year, the district worked out a contract with its support staff that cut the budget by $170,000.
“So we’re hopeful,” MacLean said.
Aside from personnel costs – 78 percent of the 2016-17 budget – MacLean said special education is another big driver in cost, and it has contributed to a rising number of support staff needed in the school.
“We’ve got to continue working on special education,” he said.
For the present, the school district is putting the final touches on its draft 2017-18 budget proposal. A public hearing will be held on Tuesday, Jan. 31 at 7 p.m. in the Merrimack Valley High School auditorium.