Fiscal Cliff? Or Money to Burn?

Feb 15, 20237 Comments

Berkeley Heights BOE School Transportation

Our financial issues have nothing to do with teachers or special needs students.

At the most recent Board of Education meeting on February 9th, there were (as usual) more bits to be talked about that can fit into a single article, so the focus of this one is on the money (no pun intended).

Our Business Administrator, Julie Kot, gave a report on where we stand on the budget (another article unto itself), the decline in enrollment (28 students since last June), then went on to alert us to the “fiscal cliff”. Ms. Kot stated, “We have reached the point that we need to talk about the fiscal cliff. This, uh, hits different schools at different times, and this is our time.”

Though there are quite a number of reasons our district finds itself here at this time, it’s apparently not due to student enrollment, yet Ms. Kot finds a way to cast some of the blame on students anyway, telling us, “Other large, um, dollar value increases include special education out-of-district tuition. We are receiving more special education students, um, and transportation, as you know, uh, went up substantially this year. It is not going to go down in the coming year, and, uh, there is additional transportation needs with the special ed students.” This is the second time Ms. Kot has gone out of her way to single out how special education students needs impact our district’s finances.

She also blamed the teachers’ contract, pointing out their 3.2% salary increase. She goes on, “The district has over $37 million in salaries. [Assumption here that she is including all salaries, not just teachers, though she doesn’t specify.] If most are increasing at 3.2%, we would need $1.2 million just to fulfill the need of the salaries.”

What she doesn’t mention in her report is the amount of money we spend on administrative costs, where both the number of positions and the amounts paid have increased substantially, starting with the year-early renewal of the Superintendent’s contract and her hefty raise, and continuing with the hiring of two Assistant Superintendents. Nor does she mention the 88% increase in the budget for legal bills. (Legal bills deserves its own article, along with mention of how Ms. Kot’s own actions have contributed to those bills.)

In wrapping up, we listened with more than a little incredulity as Ms. Kot warned us, “At this time it does look like we are going to need to make some staffing cuts, but we will not know that for certain, or how much it may be, until we receive our final state aid numbers”, suggesting that it will be the state’s fault if we have to cut, because they don’t give us enough money.

As our Business Administrator, Julie Kot, has a full-time assistant, a part-time assistant, and as of this board meeting, a “designee” to fill in for her in her role as Custodian of Government Records. She receives $172,200 a year, with a benefits package that, in addition to the standard medical and dental coverage, allows her 52 vacation, holiday, personal and sick days and for which we will pay out $217,772.

Will we see Ms. Kot start those cuts by suggesting we do something about those numbers?