Point Boro Recreation Pre-School Parents Tell Council They Want Days Back or Refund

Chris Ward just wants her 4-year-old son to go to pre-school at the Point Borough Recreation Center on Fridays in September, as planned.

She relies on that school time to get some sleep so that she can work a night shift as a registered nurse at Jersey Shore Medical Center.

"If he's not in school on Fridays, I can't sleep and I can't go to work," said Ward after Tuesday night's borough council budget workshop.  "There's got to be a way to deal with this."

"This" is the budget mess, including a $350,000 operating deficit, forcing the borough to impose furlough days on Recreation Department and many other employees.

The Recreation Department is scheduling Fridays as furlough days and is reporting on its website that it will not have summer camp on Fridays, but is extending camp from six to seven weeks.

So far, employees represented by Teamsters and the Transport Workers of America have agreed to voluntarily take five furlough days between last week and June 21, when the council has its next regular meeting.

Its next budget meeting is at 4:30 p. m. May 31.

It's likely the borough will ultimately impose an additional 28 days on borough workers, with the exception of the police department who they are not allowed to furlough, according to state law.

And possible layoffs and demotions are still on the table, although council members said at their budget workshop on Tuesday night that they are trying to find budget transfers and savings in other areas to hopefully avert those measures.

Meanwhile, the Recreation Center, like most other departments, was faced with the problem of when to start scheduling the five furlough days.

So the center on River Avenue, which houses the pre-school and many other programs, closed last Friday and this Friday.

The department may add the two days onto the end of the school year, most likely scheduled after the pre-school's June 3 graduation.

That's far from the biggest problem for parents who have already paid anywhere from $50 to $700 towards tuition for the 2011-2012 school year.

"I have a payment due on June 1," Joan Ruggiero, Eisenhower Drive, told the council. "I signed up my son to go to school Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Are we getting our money back? You're taking away children's education."

Borough Business Administrator David Maffei referred questions about any possible refunds or rescheduling to the Recreation Department.

"The Recreation Department has a lot of different programs and we can't speak for them in terms of whether they're giving any refunds," he said.

"Can the parents pay more money to keep the Rec. Center open?" Ruggiero asked, voicing an idea also mentioned by other parents later.

"We're going to go to the Rec. and see what we can work through," Leitner said. "It's subject to negotiations."

After the meeting, the discussion spilled outside where Councilman Chris Goss talked to the parents.

Goss said the borough pays for the maintenance of the Recreation Center's building and the salaries of its administrative staff, including a director and three office staffers, and tuition pays teachers' salaries.

The Recreation Center conundrum is just one of many facing council, as they struggle to find the least painful way to craft a budget that provides sufficient municipcal services, and staff to deliver them, but still meets a state-mandated 2 percent cap on municipal tax increases.

After the meeting, Councilman Robert Sabosik said the council may use 30 to 40 percent from a particular budget line item of about $500,000 to help avert further detrimental impact to employees and municipal services.

During the meeting, Mayor William Schroeder asked the council how they feel about using deferred school taxes to help balance the budget.

That would mean borrowing from taxes that the borough collected for the school district, a budget move made possible because the borough typically has six months of school taxes collected in advance, said Borough Auditor Thomas Fallon.

Councilwoman Toni DePaola defended the council's move last year to use deferred school taxes, but said she wasn't sure about doing it again.

"The council got beat up by the school district and the public for borrowing from school taxes," DePaola said. "There were people who said we were robbing Peter to pay Paul."

"I was the person who said that and I voted against it," Leitner said. However, he did not rule out considering the move this year.

Councilman Jack McHugh said he is concerned about doing that kind of "quick fix" to solve a budget problem because councils have, for many years, been doing quick fixes rather than long-term solutions.

Borough Auditor Thomas Fallon distributed to council members a "draft budget" he had prepared that called for a 23 percent tax increase, without using any furloughs, demotions, layoffs, deferred school taxes or any other tools the council is now considering.

He emphasized the budget was just a starting point for them to work with.

"That budget isn't legal because it exceeds the 2 percent tax cap by $1,125,000," he said.

Fallon noted that this year's fund balance is $326,000, compared to $1,740,000 last year, when council used $1.4 million of that surplus.

"Of that $326,000, none is usable in this budget," he said.

He noted there is a $350,000 operating deficit and a $550,000 reserve for uncollected taxes.

"It's rather bleak and there's a lot of work to do," Fallon summed up.

There was silence for two minutes and then Schroeder said, "It's kind of a tough pill to swallow."

After some discussion, council went into executive session to discuss ongoing contract negotiations with various local unions, which will also impact the budget picture.