Budget raised to $172M; taxes increased 2.58 percent

ROYERSFORD » The Spring-Ford Area School Board voted 6-3 to adopt a final budget of $172,070,735 for the 2020-2021 school year, according to a press release issued by the district.

The proposed budget includes a 2.58 percent tax increase, which equates to an increase of .7092 mills, resulting in a millage rate of 28.1869. This equates to a $70.92 increase per $100,000 assessment.

Voting no were Board President Coleen Zasowski, Vice President Thomas DiBello, who heads the board’s finance committee, and Clinton Jackson.

“We are going to have the same conversations next year, but it is going to be more painful,” said Jackson.

“We are in for a whirlwind next year,” said DiBello. “We’ll be looking at a 5 percent to 6 percent tax increase right out of the chute,” he said, adding that the cost of state

COVID-19 guidelines for re-opening “are going to be astronomical.”

“We asked the professional staff to take less of a raise and that was denied, but we have people in the community who have lost jobs, or seen salary reductions and we are putting that burden on them,” DiBello said.

“I firmly believe the increase is too high for those who have been affected by the global pandemic,” Zasowski said. “We had just recently announced our goal to get between 1 percent and 1.5 percent, but sadly we did not meet that goal as a group, not at all.”

Zasowski added “and while we are hopeful we will not have to make these hard decisions next year, in the event that we do, it is our hope that all Spring-Ford employees and their respective representatives will partner with us, to ensure the ongoing viability of the strong educational services that we do provide here at Spring-Ford.”

Collegeville resident Heidi Goldsmith

praised the board for “pushing a budget that supports the needs of the kids in our district.”

Spring City resident Lori Hoshaw said Spring-Ford is an “extremely affluent” district and “there are children in other districts who don’t have anything near what Spring-Ford children have and I know other districts that have managed to balance their budget without raising taxes that actually took from their re