By James Lomuscio
UPDATE (clarifies increase percentage) The Westport Board of Education tonight unanimously approved a $111,471,756 operating budget for 2015-16 academic year, a 2.08 percent increase over the current budget.
The school board approved budget’s next stop is the Board of Finance
While it was lower that the 3.75 percent increase that Schools Superintendent Elliott Landon had originally proposed, it was still higher than what Landon had hoped for at the meeting’s start.
Landon wanted to separate the school system’s capital expenses from its operating budget, the same way town government does—a move would have lowered budget by about $400,000 resulting in just a 1.93 percent increase, he said.
But school board member Elaine Whitney echoed concerns board member Mark Mathias, who was not present, made last week.
He said that capital expenses in the operating budget cannot be trimmed by the finance board since the board cannot trim school line items, only the overall operating budget. Once capital expenses are removed, Whitney said, the funds would be vulnerable to a line item cut.
“We have no evidence they will be funded,” she said, noting that maintenance expenses have historically been included in the school operating budgets.
“Elaine makes a good argument, and Mark made a good argument,” agreed Landon, adding that the move could result “in a slippery slope.”
Landon also noted that the Board of Finance told him that a 2.5 to 2.9 percent increase was as acceptable range for the budget, and that he anticipated no finance board criticism with the capital expenses included.
School board member Jeannie Smith, who had called Landon’s plan to bundle operating expenses outside the operating budget a creative move, was the only dissenter in this school board line item vote.
Other administrative suggested cuts proposed by Landon and Elio Longo, school business administrator, received overwhelming support from the board.
Among the line item reductions were: reducing workers compensation by $122,000, a $500,000 draw down from health insurance reserves, a $125,000 reduction in electricity costs and salary savings from teacher retirements.
School board chairman Michael Gordon lauded the board and the administration for their hard work in finalizing a budget he called lean “but is academically spectacular.”
The proposed budget includes several initiatives, including the addition of a literacy coach at each of the five elementary schools and an expansion of the current literacy coach position at Staples High School, he said.
“The literary coaches will support our teachers as they implement the new instructional approaches designed to meet the demands of the Common Core Standards and our own Westport 2025 initiative,” Gordon said.
He said the board also recently approved an additional 30 minutes of music instruction in kindergarten. “Now our youngest learners will get even more from Westport’s highly regarded music program,” he said.
In addition, there are four new courses to be offered at the high school beginning next year: Advanced Placement Computer Science Principles, Animal Behavior, Zoology, and Lifeguarding, Gordon said.
