What happened at the school budget hearing last night?

[Guest]

Facts please.

[Guest 2]

Here are some of the highlights

I have to start this off the teachers did not side with the NJEA - NJEA wanted them to stand by their 4% raise, all the teachers said no they will accept 2%. Health Insurance was raised. Health Insurance cannot be discussed for this upcoming school budget due to contractual issues. Administration is taking somewhat of a cut, but I could not figure out what the cut was -

Eliminating all late buses from the high school (I believe they said there where 3 or 4 of them)

Closing High School Library at 4

Not replacing Middle School Language Art teacher (Ulinsky) after her retirement
Cutting down one Middle School Math Teacher I believe they said to .5

No more wrestling or softball

Eliminating Home Work Club and Before School Care.

Play is cut 50% in expenses.

Gym Teachers two will stay full time - two other teachers time will be cut 25% each - to .75 each vs. full time (25% cut in pay for each)

Child Study Team - Psychologist, Social Worker, and LDTC cut 40/60%.

Eliminating French from 1st and 2nd Grade

Cutting Field Trips

Stay tuned to the school webpage, they may post last night’s presentation.

[Guest]

Just to echo the above, I was the one stating that I felt the BOE needed to be sensitive to everyone and the economic situation to which at least one person kept jumping at me. I feel that they did a good job in looking the budget and have done exactly what I was stating should be done.

It would have been nice if the teachers had agreed to no raise this year, but I am not sure it would have helped to keep at least one of the programs.

[Robert Zurfluh]

It was my understanding that the administration is getting the same raise - 2% that the teachers agreed to. I assume their expected raise would have been 3-4%, but unsure about that.

The biggest concerns about the proposed budget last night was the elimination of the late buses from Princeton and us paying Princeton HS to keep their library open for a few hours after school, so our kids have a place to go. While the total cost for busing and library services is ~33k, the library part is only ~6k - something that could possibly be raised through other sources, I guess.

[Guest]

Why not ask the public library to send money to Princeton to cover this cost?

[Guest]

I would have been more prone to support this school budget if they accepted a pay freeze for one year as most NJ works have already been asked to do.

[Guest]

I would have been more prone to support this school budget if they accepted a pay freeze for one year as most NJ workers have already been asked to do.

[Guest]

The public library is paying rent [u]and is able to buy new materials/books for the library so they are already supporting the school. In addtion, public libraries are also going through a budget crisis as well where not only is Governor Christie proposting to cut the state library budget 74% ( and this would direclty affect the database budget == the school library uses these), but the NJ legistlature is attaching the minimum funding for public libraries.[/u]

[Guest]

Linda Greenstein said she wanted to raise taxes at the meeting. That was her solution to offset the tax increase.

[Guest]

It sounds like our teachers showed a lot of courage and compassion.

[Guest3]

Literacy Coach cut 50% to .5 FTE
Gym - Cox/Manfredi cut 25% to .75 FTE
All specials teachers (art, music, IA) cut 10% to .9 FTE
French teacher Miller cut 30% to .7 FTE (eliminating French K-2)

[Guest]

[Guest]

[Guest]

How about the Education Foundation putting 6 thousand towards having the high school library stay open, instead of paying for a nice to have but unnecessary greenhouse? The public library does not have extra money in face of the state library support cuts - databases will no longer be available to school/public, and interlibrary loans are threatened. Our public library will have to find ways to pay for these things.

[Guest]

So what does anyone think will happen if we vote not to pass this budget? If it doesn't pass & gets revised, is it voted on again by the citizens?

Can't they have one after school bus for Princeton rather than two as opposed to zero?

What clubs are they talking about? The ones we PAY for?

How on earth does 15 minutes in the morning cost significant money?This will be a traffic nightmare.

[Guest]