BSD Proposal Nearly 5% Less Than This Year

January 21, 2010

The Bennington School District board made one last addition to its fiscal year 2011 budget Tuesday, which increased it by $125,000 but keeps the budget nearly 5 percent less than the current year’s budget.

The board voted 4 in favor and 2 against adding the money into the contingency fund to be used to develop and implement a new gifted and talented program for next school year.

The revised budget will decrease the cost per pupil from this year’s rate by 5 percent, to $9,495 per pupil. As the budget stood before Tuesday’s addition, the budget would ha ve seen a 6.5 percent cut to cost per pupil.

The final budget was scheduled to be warned Tuesday, but because of a misunderstanding over when budgets can be warned, it is now expected to be warned Jan. 25. It is set at $10,036,746 — a 4.83 percent reduction from the current budget of $10,546,410.

The vote to add $125,000 back into the budget came after board member George Sleeman said he didn’t feel comfortable completely cutting funding to the gifted and talented program, which the board decided to do at its last meeting on Jan. 4. Sleeman asked the board to consider putting some, if not all, of the $74,600 that was cut back into the budget.

"I feel that we should do something," Sleeman said. "We should try to keep that program alive."

Administration officials said they didn’t have an exact number of students affected by the gifted and talented teacher who serves students in the three Bennington elementary schools, although they guessed it was around 60 students.
Officials said the position was not needed as much now, as some of the gifted and talented services are supplemented in other programs.

Because adding $125,000 to the budget would nearly maintain a 5 percent decrease in cost per pupil, which many board members said was the goal, $125,000 was chosen to be added to the contingency fund, where the board can determine how it is spent.

Board members Bob Butterfield and Gene Rowley opposed the motion to add the money to the budget.