Proposed budget to hike taxes

Final vote slated for June; in other business, new sponsorship: Grand View Health Stadium

FRANCONIA » After five years in a row of 1 percent or less tax hikes, Souderton Area School Board is poised to vote at its April 26 meeting on a proposed budget raising taxes 2.4 percent for the 2018-2019 school year.

The final vote on the budget will be in June.

The proposed increase would put the tax rate at 29.6201 mills, Bill Stone, the district’s director of business affairs, said.

For the owner of a home assessed at $150,000, which is about the average for the district, the tax bill would increase by about $104, going from the current $4,338.89 to $4,443.02. Each mill equals $1 of tax per $1,000 of assessed property value.

Proposed budget figures presented at the school board’s April 11 finance committee meeting showed $126,783,366 of revenue and $129,947,866 of expenses, leaving a $3.1 million gap to be filled even with the 2.4 percent tax hike, but that gap had been narrowed from $5.2 million at the committee’s previous meeting and the district continues to work on it, Stone said.

“We do ask folks to look at their budget line by line,” he said. “We do the same thing in the business office.”

Employee salaries and benefits make up the biggest part of the proposed budget, coming in at more than $89 million.

Expected interest rate increases are projected to raise the district’s interest income by $200,000, Stone said. State funding is also expected to increase, he said.

“We’ve asked all departments to make voluntary budget reductions at this point, and those total about

$657,000,” Stone said.

Transportation costs for special education students increases in the budget, but the district is hoping to cut the costs for transporting other students.

“We’re anticipating a reduction of 10 buses. We’re still determining the logistics of how we will do that, whether it’s through routing or other factors, so that is still a rather large ‘what if,’” Stone said.

There is expected to be new safe schools funding this year from the state and/or federal government, but the details are still being worked out, Superintendent Frank Gallagher said.

The proposed 2.4 percent tax hike is the maximum allowed this year under a state cap. Last year, the board touted having been well below the cap for five years in a row.

That left board member Nicholas Braccio wondering, “What got us here?” to this year’s larger increase.

“This is a tight year because of charter school increases, special ed increases,” Gallagher said.

As expected, though, elementary school enrollment is decreasing, he said.

“That trend’s going to continue through the middle schools eventually and eventually through the high school,” he said.

Decreased enrollment will bring with it a decrease in the number of teachers needed, he said.

The district will also be paying off debt in upcoming years, which will cut the amount it now has to pay for debt service, he said.

“We’re in a tight year, there’s no question about it,” Gallagher said, “but the trajectory looks promising.”

Stadium sponsorship

Souderton Area has an agreement for its first sponsorship, Stone told the finance committee.

“It’s an agreement with Grand View Health. They will get a sponsorship agreement that includes our stadium and our gymnasium,” Stone said.

That will include signs at the stadium’s two main entrances and four other places in the stadium, decals or logos on the gym floor, announcements during games and being able to set up tables or tents with information at two basketball games and two football games, he said.

The district will be paid $27,500 per year, payable quarterly, under the three year contract that begins July 1, he said.

Other sponsorships are also being sought, so long as the sponsors are not direct competitors of primary sponsor Grand View Health, he said.

“We think that given the market that we offer in terms of who attends events at our high school, we think we are a pretty attractive draw, not just for local businesses, but also regional and national partners,” Stone said.

Public high schools cannot get the amounts of money from sponsorships that universities do, though, he said, because much of the university sponsorships are through alumni networks.

Although the details for the sponsor signage is still being finalized, the Grand View Health sign at the stadium entrances will probably be similar to its sign at the Pennridge High School stadium, which GVH also sponsors, Stone said.