Sports, tech, special ed dominate budget talks

PINE PLAINS — The Pine Plains Board of Education (BOE) met on Wednesday, March 7, to continue discussions regarding the budget.Presentations on the sports, special education and technology portions of the budget were given, with the Board of Cooperative Educative Services (BOCES) budget touched upon in each section.Assistant Superintendent for Business and Finance Michael Goldbeck was joined by representatives from each area to present preliminary numbers to the school board. Interscholastic sports Director of Health, Physical Education and Athletics Jeremy Weber presented the preliminary number for the interscholastic sports budget.“You’ll see some small increases under coaches’ salaries, but these numbers are still being negotiated,” Goldbeck said.Goldbeck also pointed out that a large decrease has come from the BOCES portion of the budget.“This will eliminate additional tournaments, and we will go back to a basic sports program,” he said.Weber proposed a budget-neutral idea to offer more options for students.“Right now we see kids hesitant to move from modified to varsity. The students need a level to play on that’s appropriate for their skill level. We want to offer junior varsity football again and boys junior varsity soccer,” he said.Weber and Goldbeck both confirmed that the two sports could be implemented through the use of coaches who are already employed and reductions in other areas.Weber also hopes to be able to make the same offer with girls junior varsity soccer in the future.“I’m open to this change if it can be done in a budget-neutral way,” Superintendent Linda Kaumeyer said.Board Member Heather Boucher raised concerns over the two proposed sports being for male students.“What about girls sports? I know you want to reintroduce junior varsity soccer in the future, but why choose two boy sports now?” she asked.Weber responded, “The girls currently have volleyball and field hockey available on the junior varsity level. The boys have nothing, so this will even it out.”Kaumeyer also referenced a regionwide concern.“There were concerns that there would be no junior varsity, as many districts are struggling with cutbacks this year. Jeremy has informed me that those concerns are dissipating as other districts are going through this same process and trying to find other areas to make cuts from, so that is a bit of good news,” she said. Technology Director of Educational Technology Richard Harlin joined Goldbeck next to present the technology budget.“You’ll see an overall increase of half a percent,” said Goldbeck, who noted that a number of reductions were made to help make the increase as small as possible.Harlin requested that the proposed personnel reductions in this department be taken from the BOCES budget by reducing services instead of in-staff hours.“You’d be essentially losing valuable technician time — that is, my time — as I will be doing more of those clerical things,” he said.Harlin stressed the importance of maintaining services that are currently in place as well as keeping an eye on the future.“We have to maintain our infrastructure. We’re also moving forward with our wireless infrastructure, which will open up options for mobile devices as we go ahead,” he said.Board member Helene McQuade asked if there were any grant options available for the technology department.“Unfortunately much of the state aid has dried up,” said Catherine Parsons, assistant superintendent for curriculum instruction and pupil personnel services. Special education and pupil personnel services >/strong> The final presentation on special education and pupil personnel services was given by Goldbeck along with Maryann Stoorvogel, director of special education.“The numbers being presented are fairly accurate as this budget requires us to go student by student. Not all of the student evaluations have been done, so there may be slight changes, but we’ve included out best guesses at this point in the year,” he said.Each student’s services are based on individual needs and evaluations.The academic intervention portion of the budget shows a small increase which is due to salaries.“These are contractual increases, so they are accurate,” said Goldbeck.Goldbeck confirmed that there is an increase of more than $50,000 for special education and that most of that number is related to salary.“Many students require special services that we do not offer here. Therefore they must be taken to other facilities and there are transportation costs involved,” Stoorvogel said. Personnel Parsons joined Goldbeck for a brief talk on personnel.“Any increases you see are contractual. The reductions come from closer looks at the overall budget,” she said.The board agreed that the numbers were straight forward and required no further information. Wrap-up Kaumeyer reminded the audience of the preliminary nature of these discussions, and said a more full presentation will be made during a meeting on Wednesday, March 21, at Cold Spring Early Learning Center at 7 p.m. It will also include a proposition for May 15 voter approval to sell or donate the Attlebury Schoolhouse to the Stanford Historical Society.Goldbeck also presented a proposition for voter approval on May 15 to purchase three 65-passenger buses at $114,570 each and three 20-passenger buses at $45,150 each.Goldbeck pointed out the buses that need replacing are costing a large amount in repairs.“We did not purchase buses last year. We have a $10,000 line in the budget for repairs. As of March we’ve already had to spend over $25,000 mostly on these older buses,” he said.Kaumeyer said the transportation department would decide if the older buses would be saved as spares or sold once the new buses were purchased.The board agreed that pending any liability issues, Millbrook would be able to use the high school athletic fields while its facilities are currently undergoing work.Kaumeyer also made the board aware of a meeting between herself and Mike Porter of the Durst Organization, which is behind the Carvel property development project.“They want to extend the opportunity to come in and talk with the board regarding impacts on the district from the proposed Carvel project,” she said.The board said it appreciated the offer and would like to proceed. Kaumeyer said she will make Porter aware of their decision.The floor was then opened up for public comment in which several members of the community came forth to speak about the budget. For a detailed account of the public comment portion, see the article on the front page.

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