Ringwood schools set to cut 30 positions

School board has to deal with budget shortfall

RINGWOOD – A projected $1.1 million cut to the borough’s school budget for 2024-25 is turning out to be bad news for taxpayers.

Revenue shortfalls combined with rising expenses saw Board of Education members this month introduce a $29.8 million preliminary budget for the 2024-25 school year. While a significant drop from the current year’s $30.9 million budget, the spending plan is expected to come with a 2.64% increase in the school tax levy and a cut of 30 fulltime equivalent positions, district officials said.

In a statement on behalf of the school board, Board President Patrick Diamond said the budget proposal was “jaw-dropping” and apologized to the district’s staff. Diamond said board members were told the district was in good shape financially and unaware of any significant looming shortfalls until December 2023.

“This is difficult to swallow because we thought we were being well informed,” Diamond said.

Superintendent Nicholas Bernice, who the school board is seeking to replace later this year, said the board’s statement came as a surprise as the district’s revenue issues and increasing expenditures have been well documented in annual audit and monthly financial reports.

Over the past five years, the district has seen a reduction in state equalization aid from $1.1 million to $78,000. Nevertheless, it added counselors, math teachers and other positions to meet need and demand on the back of surpluses generated from federal aid during the COVID-19 pandemic. Those surpluses helped sustain what state officials had deemed an overfunded district relative to its enrollment in their aid formula, Bernice said.

Now, the pandemic windfalls are gone, and the district must adjust, Bernice said. With a cap of 2% on most spending increases outside of employee benefits, the ability to generate revenue is limited and another six-figure reduction in surplus is expected next year, he added. To help generate a future surplus, cuts in expenditures are needed, Bernice said.

“You do as much as you can for as long as you can as well as you can, and I think that Ringwood has done that,” Bernice said.

Board of Education members, however, have disagreed with Bernice’s leadership in recent years, prompting them to deny him a contract extension in late 2023, when the New Jersey Association of School Administrators named him the state’s 2024 Superintendent of the Year. Diamond said the board has since identified four potential replacements, including one internal candidate. The interview process is ongoing, he said, and a replacement for the coming school year could be made as soon as a special meeting scheduled for March 27.

A new superintendent would be arriving at a time when state aid is starting to stabilize after years of declines. The $1.8 million the district is set to receive in 2024-25 is up roughly $94,000 from the current school year’s allocation. Still, it is projected to remain about half of what it was in the 2009-10 school year next year, state records show. It is also due to be down more than $800,000 from five years ago, state records show.

The borough is not alone. Neighboring communities in North Jersey’s development-restricted Highlands region, such as Bloomingdale, Vernon, Jefferson, Wanaque and West Milford, have also seen cumulative aid drops in recent years to reflect historical enrollment declines.

Costs, however, continue to rise. The preliminary budget for the borough’s school district shows an expected $389,000 reduction in salaries. However, rising personnel costs, due to contractual salary increases, mean an estimated 30 full-time equivalent positions need to be eliminated to active that savings, district budget records show.

Meanwhile, the cost of employee benefits is expected to rise by $831,000, district records show. There are projected increases in the transportation budget of $230,000, the facilities budget of $223,000 and the out-of-district tuition budget of $140,000, those records show.

The district contains four K-8 schools with 1,034 students. The borough’s high school students attend Lakeland Regional High School in Wanaque.