Regional Budget May Face Big Rise: Student Outplacements Could Cost $400,000


FALLS VILLAGE — It looks like it will be an especially challenging year for the Region One Board of Education as it prepares its new budget.

That was the message at a Tuesday night meeting of the newly named All Board Chairs Committee (ABC), an advisory panel made up of the six elementary school board chairs and Region One Board of Education Chairman Judge Manning. The ABC Committee was formerly known as the Regional Services Committee (RSC).

There are bright spots in the preliminary 2007-08 spending package. After years of increases as high as 15 percent annually, health-insurance premiums have been brought under control, as have energy costs. That means spending increases at Housatonic Valley Regional High School and the superintendent’s office will likely be held to about 3 percent.

But there are also significant increases expected in the special education budget (also known as the Pupil Services Center). The purchased services line is expected to increase by almost 80 percent as a result of the addition of a handful of disabled students whose needs cannot be met without placement to private institutions. Including transportation costs for those students, the purchased services line will move up to about $1.4 million.

Sam Herrick, the Region One business manager, told the committee the list of students requiring out-of-district placements grew by four pupils, whose combined tuition and transportation costs are more than $400,000.

"Enrollments are going down," Herrick said of the high school and the six elementary schools in the region. "But expensive outplacements are going up and it’s a trend, not just in Region One, but elsewhere."

The Region One school district includes the towns of Canaan, Cornwall, Falls Village, Kent, Salisbury and Sharon.

Herrick added that "it’s next to impossible to keep [overall budget] increases low when you’re looking at these kinds of outplacement numbers."

Since fighting the outplacements would involve many billable hours of work on the part of Region One attorneys, legal fees would likely rise if the placements were contested.

The preliminary proposed Region One budget calls for spending increases of 3 percent at the high school and the Regional Schools Services Center (also known as the central office, or the superintendent’s office) and more than 15 percent in Pupil Services.

The net proposed Region One budget is about $13,461,000, a 7.25 percent rise over 2006-07.

This year’s $12,585,467 budget, which passed overwhelmingly in a May referendum, was a 4.23 percent increase over 2005-06.

"It’s not an inflated budget," Region One Superintendent Patricia Chamberlain said of the proposed spending package. "At first glance it might seem to be but it’s not."

Manning said he’s glad the Pupil Services costs are shared equally among all six towns, whereas each town is assessed high school costs based on the number of students attending from that town.

"If these [outplacement] costs were borne by each town on its own, one student could break the budget," Manning said.

Herrick said the Region One Board of Education will meet Dec. 21 to review the special education budget, with budget workshops beginning in January.

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