Princeton Regional school budget ready

Officials predict tax-rate impact will be ‘significant.’

By: Jeff Milgram
   The Princeton Regional Board of Education is expected tonight to introduce and adopt a tentative $58.8 million budget for the 2003-2004 school year, 7.5 percent higher than this year’s $54.7 million spending plan.
   The board’s Finance Committee will give the budget a final review this morning before it goes to the full board tonight.
   A public hearing and final vote on the budget will be held at 8 p.m. March 25. The budget will be voted on April 15.
   Tonight, at its monthly meeting, the board also is expected to approve using $576,982 in "banked cap" — money it could have spent this year but didn’t — to pay for teacher salaries and benefits.
   The district can bank the money for only two years.
   With state aid frozen at about $3.5 million for the second year in a row, the budget calls for $42.7 million to be raised in local property taxes, about $2.8 million more than this year.
   While the total assessed value in both Princeton Borough and Princeton Township has increased this year, school district officials have not yet calculated the tax rate. The increase in assessed value will spread out the tax burden.
   Princeton Township’s total assessed value increased $30 million this past year, said Tax Assessor Carol Caskey. In the borough, the total assessed value increased $2 million, she said.
   While Acting Business Administrator Jennifer Micale had not yet come up with the tax rate, the board’s vice president, Anne Burns, said tax increases will be "significant."
   She estimated that the tax rate in Princeton Borough will go up more than 10 percent from this year’s rate of $1.309 per $100 of assessed value. The increase in Princeton Township could go up more than 8 percent, from this year’s $1.25 per $100 of assessed value, she said.
   "Half of that is due to the referendum," Ms. Burns said, referring to voter approval of the district’s $81.3 million expansion and renovation program in May 2001.
   The board was initially faced with expenses in the upcoming budget that were $2.2 million over the state-mandated cap, requiring a major paring of spending requests.
   With a 3-percent cap, the district could increase the budget by only $1.4 million. With an estimated $1.3 million going to pay for salary increases, only $100,000 is left over for other budget requests.
   The board will hire fewer new teachers this coming year, school board President Charlotte Bialek said Monday. She said Superintendent Claire Sheff Kohn asked each of the district’s six schools to come up with additional budget cuts.
   One victim of the budget crunch was a cart used to take injured athletes off the playing field, Ms. Bialek said.
   The board continues to look for private donors for the IDEAS Center tutoring and enrichment program, Ms. Bialek said.
   The district looked at several options on how to deal with the budget crunch, including use of the banked cap.
   Fueling the budget shortfall:
   • Out-of-district special education costs are expected to rise $1 million.
   • Medical insurance will go up $500,000.
   • The payment to the Princeton Charter School will increase $250,000 because of an increase in charter school enrollment.
   • Heating and electricity costs will go up $65,000.
   • Additional personnel, including a special education teacher who specializes in autism for the John Witherspoon Middle School, will cost $500,000.
   This year’s school budget went up 12.8 percent over the prior year, largely because of $4.7 million in debt service to pay for the $60.9 million in construction bonds.
   In addition to the budget, the board will consider a resolution authorizing the spending of $800,000 to purchase and install computer cabling at the four elementary schools.
   The money comes from the district’s capital reserve account and does not represent money that has to be raised by taxes, Ms. Bialek said. Taxpayers will decide whether the board can use the money, however.
   "We have the money, but we have to ask the taxpayers to use it," she said.
   The funds are not included in the referendum dollars, but were approved in the district’s Long-Range Facilities plan.
   Polls will be open from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. on April 15.