Advisory Committee to Work on 2012-13 School Budget

The Long Beach School District’s Citizens Budget Advisory Committee, an 11-member committee of local resident volunteers and school officials that offers recommendations for the proposed budget to the Board of Education, faces both new and perennial challenges this budget season.

As budget talks kicked off this week, the committee and school officials must consider the newly enacted property tax cap — which the State Senate passed by a 57-to-5 margin last June, and limits the amount that a school district or village board can increase property taxes in a given year to 2 percent, or the rate of inflation — as they prepare the 2012-13 budget, according to the Long Beach Herald. With a 60 percent majority of voters, however, local communities can override the cap on a school budget.

About the issues that board and the committee must address this year, School Board Vice President Roy Lester said:

“The tax cap is the biggest challenge, so are increased pension costs, and trying to stay solvent with reserves is always important. Those are things we have to consider. The problem is there are a lot of liabilities that any district has that have to be adequately funded. We’re looking at everything.”

Last year, before residents voted to approve the district’s $118.6 million budget for 2011-12 — a 1.8 percent, or $2.1 million, increase in spending and a 0 percent increase in the tax levy over of the previous year’s budget — the committee singled out the budget’s larger percentage increases that come in the form of state mandates, including teachers’ retirement and health insurance, as well as unemployment insurance, which was projected to rise 333 percent, from $30,000 to $130,000. The committee also noted an increase in employee benefits — $9.21 million or 44.3 percent higher than 2009-10 expenses — for special focus during its presentation in late March.

These were among 17 proposals the committee presented to the board before its trustees adopted the proposed budget in early April.