Doug Carman

By: centraljersey.com
Superintendent Ed Forsthoffer said the unexpected financial aid the East Windsor Regional School District will receive from the state will save some – but likely not all – of the jobs he previously expected to have to slash in the proposed 2011-2012 budget.
Mr. Forsthoffer said the school district will receive $780,721 more in state aid than the $15.6 million in the "best case" scenario he projected for the district during times where he expected budget slashing from the state to be the norm. The district received $15.6 million in state aid last year.
Though he said in an e-mail that he’ll have the new budget projections better solidified by the March 7 school board meeting, Mr. Forsthoffer said Tuesday that the district is looking at only about "a dozen or more" positions to be cut instead of the 35 layoffs he projected in January.
"I am still in communication with the various associations in our district and my hope is we can negotiate something with them to avoid any layoffs," Mr. Forsthoffer wrote in an e-mail.
School district teachers, support staff and administrators organize under three separate unions. Messages sent to the presidents of the three unions were not returned.
In January, Mr. Forsthoffer told the Herald he had ruled out any possibility of receiving extra aid, believing the state was in no position to increase its school funding. However, Gov. Chris Christie announced in an address in late February that the state would do just that for many of the state’s school districts.
The state cut more than $3 million in aid last year, which Mr. Forsthoffer said amounted to 5 percent of the district’s total budget. The $780,000 increase still left the district 4 percent down from 2009-2010’s $77.6 million budget, but "this additional aid will certainly help," he said.
The superintendent had predicted that up to 95 layoffs would have been necessary if the state had cut its aid allocation again this year.
The school district’s budget for the current fiscal year ending June 30 is about $72.7 million, with nearly $56 million of that budget funded by local property taxes. State and federal aid covers the rest of the budget.
Mr. Forsthoffer previously told the Herald that a proposed 2-percent tax levy increase – the maximum increase allowed under the state’s cap – could add $1.1 million to its revenue if it is approved by voters. That increase, though, wouldn’t cover the $1.7 million in salary increases for the district, which employs about 700 teachers and staff. Combined with rising fuel costs and health care expenses, Mr. Forsthoffer projected a $2.4 million deficit had the aid been held at $15.6 million.