By James Lomuscio
At its first meeting heralding the the unofficial end of summer and the start of new academic year, the Westport Board of Education tonight unanimously approved the transfer of $387,523 within its 2010-11 budget.
The transfer makes a final adjustment to budgeted line items reflecting actual expenses for the year, the report states.
The five members present also approved the End of Year Financial Report presented by Nancy Harris, assistant superintendent of business.
The 16-page report detailed all of the expenses for the last year’s more than $96.07 million operating budget. According to Harris, the transfer was necessitated by the board voting to return $283,654 in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (AARA) funds to the town.
“The Board of Education voted to return this amount to the town in lieu of a portion of the Education Cost Sharing Grant that is normally part of the town educational revenue from the State of Connecticut,” Harris wrote in a letter to Landon.
Because of this, she said, various areas of expenditures were reduced, such as supplies, materials and,building maintenance.
“I was literally holding purchase orders,” Harris said, stressing that there were no delays that would have compromised “the health and safety of schools.”
The bulk of the transfer money comes from final salary and benefits fund balances to be shifted to property, services and equipment.
Donald O’Day, school board chairman, lauded Harris’ report, saying, “We had to drive the car into the gas station with the gas tank at zero.”
“Hats off,” he said, noting that the school system had to cope with unanticipated special education costs.
In other matters, the school board listened to and gave input to Schools Superintendent Elliott Landon’s school system goals for 2011-12.
The pillars of Landon’s plan included: continuous improvement in the curriculum, instruction and assessment; safe, secure and well maintained space for students; quality education that is cost efficient; the development of a contemporary mission statement that has regular school board input; human resources to ensure the highest quality staff; and crisis/emergency preparedness.
Under Landon’s curriculum goal were the emphasis of the development of thinking skills and preparing students to compete on a global scale, what Landon has dubbed the “2025 Project.”
Board member Jim Marpe said that in terms of curriculum and instruction, he saw “2025 as the cornerstone of our objective for the year.”
