WEST AMWELL: SHRHS budget ready for April 21 balloting

Taking hits from the taxpayers at hearing were teachers’ salaries and the cost of special education

By Linda Seida, Staff Writer
   WEST AMWELL — South Hunterdon Regional High School officials fielded questions about expenses from about 15 taxpayers who attended a public hearing on the district’s $10.5 million proposed budget.
   The Board of Education approved the preliminary budget April 2.
   The budget will go to voters for their approval April 21.
   Taking hits from the taxpayers were teachers’ salaries and the cost of special education. Teachers’ salaries and benefits make up about 75 percent of the budget, according to the district.
   Al Berke, a Lambertville resident who teaches in another district, urged South Hunterdon’s teachers to “be realistic” when they begin negotiating their new contract.
   ”They have to be realistic,” he said. “I’m lucky I’m working.”
   Teachers are in the last year of their contract. They received a 4.3 percent raise this year.
   ”I got no raise, and my husband has to give up days. I’d like to know anybody in this building who got that kind of raise,” Kristin Cree, of West Amwell, said of the people who attended the meeting last week.
   She later added, “The entitlement is gone.”
   Board member Laurie Weinstein said a meeting with the teachers’ union is scheduled this week when the district and the teachers will exchange proposals and set up future meeting dates. The meetings are confidential and not open to the public.
   Also under fire was the special education budget. It will total about $2.2 million, or roughly a quarter of the operating budget. The cost includes tuition for out-of-district placements and transportation.
   Mr. Berke said the district has to “make sure kids are not classified to the point where it becomes a crutch.”
   ”We’re not classifying kids here,” Superintendent Nancy Gartenberg said. “We’re receiving them.”
   She explained most of the special education population at South Hunterdon received the designation at their elementary schools before they moved on to South Hunterdon, which serves grades seven through 12.
   Upon classification, the students receive an Individualized Education Plan, known as an IEP. It is a legal document that spells out the special help an individual student requires and the district is obligated to provide.
   The budget includes an increase of $215,000. This would pay for 13 additional ESL students, eight additional students who have chosen to attend the Hunterdon County Polytech school, an additional tuition student, the lease purchase of two buses, a utilities increase and a new soccer program.
   The district proposes to reduce the budget by $255,000 by consolidating extracurricular and athletic programs based on the amount of student interest, paying for all field trips with fundraising and going paperless with some district communications, such as the district calendar.
   If voters approve the budget, taxes to support the school would increase in each of the three sending districts.
   In Lambertville, the tax rate would be 65.84 cents per $100 of assessed value. For the owner of a house assessed at the average of $371,000, the tax to support the school would increase $70.25 to $2,442.66.
   In West Amwell, the tax rate would be 58.23 cents per $100 of assessed value. For the owner of a house assessed at the average of $456,000, the tax bill would increase $45.60 to $2,655.29.
   In Stockton, the tax rate would be 44.63 cents per $100 of assessed value. The owner of a house assessed at the average of $322,000 would pay $93.71 more for a total of $1,437.09.
   Polls will be open April 21 from 3-9 p.m.
   In Stockton, voters may cast their ballots at the firehouse on Mill Street.
   In West Amwell, voters may cast their ballots at the municipal building at 150 Rocktown-Lambertville Road.
   In Lambertville, voters in wards 1 and 2 may cast their ballots at the YMAC on Wilson Avenue. Voters in wards 3-1 and 3-2 may cast their ballots at the Centenary United Methodist Church on North Union Street.