Even After Cuts, $3.5M in School Capital Projects Loom

Although the $44 million West Deptford Township public school budget meets a lot of the district objectives while making necessary improvements in curriculum and resources for at-risk students, it's still off by some $1.9 million from what school officials sought initially.

And that means that an estimated $3.5 million in capital projects will have to be delayed for future budgets from 2014 to 2017.

Crossed off the list this year were two replacement fire alarm systems for Green-Fields and Oakview Elementary schools ($250,000 apiece) and a new gym floor for Green-Fields ($50,000).

A slide from the budget presentation from Superintendent Kevin Kitchenman lists a number of other upcoming priorities, including a $731,250 replacement of rooftop HVAC units at the West Deptford Middle School, which are so antiquated that it's difficult to source parts for them, he said.

"Obviously there’s more that doesn’t fit the list," said Kitchenman; "that’s the priorities for the next three years."

Typically, Kitchenman said, the district attempts to budget $500,000 for annual capital improvements. Last year, he said, a lot of that money went to replacing three-quarters of the roof of Oakview.

Still other dollars went to replacing cafeteria tables in the district, "which doesn’t sound like a lot," Kitchenman said, but which became a construction project "because they’re the kind that get stored in the wall."

Another major recent renovation the district was able to tackle with its capital budget was a resurfacing of the West Deptford High School tennis courts, which Kitchenman said "were decrepit and a lawsuit waiting to happen."

"This year we had no capital," he said. "We’re getting to the point that we’ve got another course, which is to obviously go out and get a significant sum of money all at once.

"If we could stabilize the ratable base, we could have gone out to a full 2 percent tax levy this year, and it would have had a very minimal impact on the taxpayer," Kitchenman said.

Referendum possible

Some of the capital improvement needs of the district are cosmetic in nature, some are structural and some are related to safety concerns, said Board of Education President Christopher Strano.

“It’s a lot of maintenance things," he said. "A lot of old stuff needs to be replaced."

The current-year budget meets a lot of necessary goals on a shoestring, Strano said.

"I think it was important for us to really retire the old debt and home in on what our goals are as a district, improving the curriculum," he said.

But absent any significant increase in the ratable base of the Township, Strano said, the Board is likely to "reach out the community and see where we can get support vis-à-vis businesses, corporations, things like that.

"And then we really have to have a discussion with the community, looking at possibly a referendum to do some of these things," he said.