Public hearing — and last chance to change budget — is March 26
By Gene Robbins, Managing Editor
School officials expect to release more detail about the proposed 2012-13 school budget next week after board members meet in committee to look at possible changes.
The board has been seeking public comments about what to spend or how much to allot to property tax relief. The district is receiving a windfall of state aid this year, plus unexpected aid that came last year after the budget was struck.
The board has one more meeting Monday, March 26, at 7:30 p.m. at Auten Road Intermediate School to make changes to the budget before the public votes on the tax levy Tuesday, April 17.
At Monday’s meeting, two teachers asked about the need to hire to bring down class sizes, whether substitutes’ pay could be increased even more than $7 a day that is planned and how Spanish and Mandarin Chinese teachers will be deployed when languages are re-instituted in elementary schools next fall.
March 5, the board passed, 4-3, a tentative budget of $113.7 million in order to meet the deadline of the county executive superintendent of schools. There were questions raised that night about the decision to stay more than $1.1 million dollars under the allowable 2 percent rise in tax impact.
Board member Judy Haas warned March 5 that the decision not to use more of the allowed and available money could haunt the district for years to come. She said that going to full cap would raise the increase for the “average” Hillsborough home by $58 opposed to the $32 the tentative budget would call for.
In particular, board Vice President Marc Rosenberg asked for a planned hiring of two jobs a nurse and high school guidance counselor be increased to a full-time job from the planned half a work week.
The proposed budget would seek $81.5 million in Hillsborough property tax dollars and $807,000 from Millstone property owners. Because of a decrease in tax ratables, the “average” Millstone homeowner will see a rise of $204, the school projects.
The district benefits this year from a projected 7 percent increase, or $1.7 million, in state aid, to a total of $24.9 million.
Superintendent Jorden Schiff said Monday that the proposed budget would cut no programs or staff, would lower class sizes at the high school and would show the list of improvements planned for each school building. He said there are 19 full-time positions in the proposed budget. That may sound like a lot, he said, but said the district was trying to recover from two years ago when state aid cuts led to the reduction of 66 staff members.
He said two of three technology trainers would be kept as well as four teachers at elementary schools to reduce class sizes. Those positions are being funded in the current year from an approximately $900,000 federal Ed Jobs grant that expires at the end of August and would have to be paid for out of the local budget for 2012-13.
In the initial budget presentation, Dr. Schiff said the proposed budget would fund technology improvements, including the purchase of 750 tablet-type laptop computers for teachers. The first of four lease-purchase payments totaling $1.4 million would be in the budget.
As proposed, the tax rate to support the school budget would rise by 0.4 percent, adding up to $9 for each $100,000 of assessed value, in Hillsborough and $63 per $100,000 assessed value in Millstone.

