At the May Newburgh School District Board of Education meeting most of the attention was on the BOE statement on the student athlete attendance issue and the public response. There were two HR resolutions, one abolishing pedagogical, and one abolishing non-pedagogical positions, which passed. No details as to number of staff laid off were made public at that time.

Now the May meeting minutes are available, and they provide the number and names of laid-off staff. It looks like there were a total of 92 layoffs. Please do check the minutes and let me know if there is anything off with these calculations.

Click through for the details.

On Tuesday May 3 at 7 PM the state required public presentation of the Newburgh School District budget and the Newburgh Free Library budget took place at the NFL auditorium. Assistant Superintendent of Finance Pacella and Library Director Verdibello made their presentations; there were no questions from the ten or so members of the public in attendance; and the meeting was over in around fifteen minutes.

The powerpoint presentation from the talk is available on the district website.

Pacella is scheduled to present the budget again at the Central Compact meeting Thursday May 5 (tonight!) at 6:30 PM at Fostertown.

Some 2011-2012 budget documents have been posted at the Newburgh School District website.

Budget Presentation Report is the 22 page line item summary of the proposed 2011-2012 budget. The proposed budget is $218,942,030 a reduction of 3.32% from the 2010-2011 adopted budget.

Revenue Presentation Report is a one page summary of expected revenue sources for the district in 2011-2012.

The Summary of Changes includes summary information about the reductions in staff for 2011-2012. There are a few details that have not been shared with the public before. For instance, the West Street School closing will result in a reduction of 11 teachers. Bottom line staff reductions are Admin: 9, Teachers: 78.1, T. Assists: 31, CSEA: 21.

At the fifth budget meeting on April 5, the Newburgh School District BOE approved these budget items:

43. Reinstate two guidance counselor positions instead of two social worker positions.
44. Reduce one position in art.
45. Reduce two positions in music.
46. Admin retirement incentive. Effect on budget was not stated.
47. Reduce 20 elementary teaching assistants.

With these changes, the budget is at 218,942,025 with an estimated tax levy impact of 3.78%. This includes use of 2,000,000 of fund balance.

Lunch monitor positions were restored by being shifted to the food service budget.
The reduction in teaching positions for 2011-12 is to be 78.
Budget submission is expected to happen on April 12.

Notes are a little abbreviated this time, everyone's a bit jaded by this process: meeting notes here.

At the fourth budget meeting on March 31, the Newburgh School District BOE approved these changes:

24. Reduce music creative academic specialist at Fostertown.
25. Reduce an art position at NFA.
26. Reduce a phys ed position at NFA.
27. Reduce two clerical in C&I.
28. Eliminate a typist at NFA.
29. Eliminate a telephone operator position.
30. Eliminate an account clerk position.
31. Reduce 1 community resource officer.
32. Cancel Renwick Lease (pending advice of attorney).
34. Reduce 10 assistant coaches, and other athletics items.
35. Reinstate 2 Save teachers; eliminate 2 teaching assistant positions.
36. Retain 3 of 5 directors. Eliminate 2 elementary AP positions.
37. Eliminate an academic specialist position at Temple Hill.
38. Eliminate 3 sixth grade teacher positions.
39. New CSEA contract results in reduction in projected salary.
40. Reduce 3 part time security monitors at NFA.
41. NTA retirement incentive yields savings.
42. Reduce a one-on-one assistant.
43. Reduce 2 psychologists; add a social worker.

And bubbled two items:

24. Eliminate the strings music program in the elementary grades.
33. Reduce elementary teaching assistant positions.

With these changes, the budget is $1,165,000 short of the established target.

The next budget meeting is on Tuesday April 5. The BOE will allow time for public comment at that meeting.

Click through for the detailed notes.

The March BOE meeting was held this Tuesday at the GAMS cafeteria. There were at least 200 people in the audience. Before the meeting students played instruments they had made, and there was a rousing rendition of God Bless America by an orchestra and chorus. The meeting was dominated by speakers at public comment time, which was moved to the beginning of the meeting. About two dozen people spoke, mostly about Guidance Counselors, Teaching Assistants, Pre-K, West Street, and Music programs.

Click through for the March BOE meeting notes.

Someone posted a very good comment which I will add as a comment to this post.

Here are some more detailed notes about the third budget meeting of the Newburgh School District Board of Education. This was the Monday, March 21 meeting at GAMS.

Reminder: the next (and perhaps the final) opportunity for public input on the budget before it is finalized will be at the BOE meeting on Tuesday March 29 at 7 p.m. The location for the meeting will be the GAMS cafeteria/auditorium.

The third budget meeting of the Newburgh School District Board of Education was held Monday, March 21 at 5:30 p.m.

Significant cuts were approved by the board. Item numbers are from the presentation. Note that these changes are not final until the budget is written down and approved.

Changes approved by the board:

11. Don't employ college students to bar code books. (65,382)
12. Revise start times at several buildings. (900,000)
13. Reduce all lunch monitors and four cleaning positions. (250,000)
14. Eliminate a locksmith position.
15. Don't fill two anticipated retirements in technology department. (200,381)
16. Miscellaneous budget items to be reduced. (3,304,000)
17. At secondary level reduce: 1 AP, 1 clerical, 20.6 teachers, 5 TAs.
18. At elementary level reduce: 3 clerical, 13.5 teachers.
19. (lunch monitors--consolidated with item 13)
24. Move Pre-K from Washington St to the elementaries. (716,000)
26. Guidance counselors: reduce by 2. (207,895)
27. School psychologists: reduce by 1. (90,750)
28. Reduce reading specialists by 9. (647,442)
29. Reduce business courses at NFA: 5 positions. (718,633)

Items either bubbled or not yet discussed:

20. Reduce 2 clerical: bubbled pending reconsideration of reduction of director positions.
21. Reduce teaching assistants by half, 41 positions. (1,900,000)
22. Reduce teaching assistants (by the remaining half).
23. Half time kindergarten versus full time: not discussed.
25. Reduce social workers by 3: bubbled.

Items rejected by the board:

30. Sports: consider elimination of crew, ski, hockey teams.
31. Add a clerical position to tech department.

Items expected for discussion at next budget meeting, March 31:

Fine and performing arts.
Couple of retirement incentive programs.
Imminent ratification of CSEA contract.
Eliminate 5 director positions: will be brought back for further consideration.

All of the changes approved so far amount to 14.5M in savings, 4M additional is needed.

Since the budget proposals are never shared with the audience in a written form, the content of the proposals (and sometimes even the board's decision on a proposal) can be difficult to follow. Please let me know if any corrections are needed.

Source document is the proposed Newburgh School District 2010-2011 budget document dated April 30, 2010. Note that these numbers are neither the actual costs for 2010-2011, nor are they the proposed budget for 2011-12. Still, they can provide sense of the order of magnitude of costs and where the budget dollars get spent...

The transport contracts and plant operations items include several budget lines. These ten items account for just over two thirds of the budget:

Here are detailed notes from the Newburgh School District March 3 Budget Workshop.

The budget remains quite far from the target. There are only three more Budget Workshop meetings scheduled:

• Monday March 21 at 5:30 p.m.
• Thursday March 31 at 5 p.m.
• Thursday April 7 at 5 p.m.

Board President Fucheck invited public comment at the Tuesday March 29 BOE meeting.

The second Newburgh School District budget meeting was held Thursday, March 3 at 4 p.m.

Superintendent Pizzo welcomed everyone. He said, "we don't want people going out of here with rumors and half-baked ideas about what's going on. For example, word has gotten back to us that we were cutting the accelerated program at Horizons. That was never under discussion at all about cutting the program. As a matter of fact, we were going to enhance it in next years' budget. There's a number of people that think that we're cutting a dual language program out of West Street School. That was never the point. We may be closing the facility, but we're not closing the program."

As occurred at meeting one, only a few items were outright approved by the Board:

Eliminate three Save room positions.
Eliminate Extended School Year K-2 literacy program.
Eliminate five Director positions.
Eliminate a nurse position at St. Josephs.

Among the items discussed and left for a future decision ("bubbled"):

Reduce by 1/2 the number of K and 1st grade Teaching Assistants.
Eliminate five Social Worker positions.

Many other topics came up, but progress was limited. There is still a lot of work to do to reach the budget targets the Board has set.

Meeting notes will be up in a day or two.

The Times Herald-Record has some coverage of this meeting.

Several big changes to the Newburgh School District were proposed at the Budget Workshop meeting on Thursday February 17, 2011.

Only a few items were outright approved by the Board:

Stop leasing property at Stewart Airport.
Do not fill Deputy Superintendent Position.
Remove all students from West Street School and relocate programs into other buildings.

Among the items discussed and left on the table for additional information gathering and a future decision:

Phasing out accelerated program at Horizons.
Eliminating all lunch monitor positions except those at NFA.
Relocate the Pre-K program from Washington Street into other buildings.
Consider changes to 91 teachers on special assignment.
Eliminate all extended school year programs other than one targeted to HS graduation requirements.
Change the school opening times of TH, MH, NFA, HOH, GAMS, and FOS to reduce bus requirements.
Consider elimination of school monitor positions at elementary level.
Consider changes to assistant principal positions at elementary level.
Reconsider Community Resource Officer positions.
Consider cuts to Athletics.
Eliminate a Pre-K testing site.
Consider cutbacks to occupational education programs.
Consider elimination of first grade teaching assistants.
Consider cutbacks in Director positions.
Consider changes to Social Worker positions.

If I followed things correctly, the only item rejected by the Board for future consideration was the violence prevention coordinator position.

Board President Fucheck said that there is no public input at Budget Workshop meetings. She suggested that the public could speak to the Board at regular BOE meetings.

The next Newburgh Schools BOE meeting is Tuesday February 22 at 7 p.m.

The next Budget Workshop meeting is Thursday March 3 at 4 p.m.

Click here for notes from the February 17 Budget Workshop.