EW school board sets $55.2M tax levy

Richard Tedesco

The East Williston Board of Education set the 2014-15 school district tax levy last Wednesday at $52.20 million, a 2.43 percent increase over the prior year’s tax levy.

The levy is unchanged from what the school board projected when it approved the $55.74 million budget for 2014-15 in early April. 

East Williston Assistant Superintendent for Business Jacqueline Pirro said the levy is $145,000 below the allowable tax levy increase under the state-mandated tax cap.

 “We were able to stay within the property tax levy cap and come below and still maintain our programs and add new programs,” East Williston Superintendent of Schools Elaine Kanas said during in a presentation on the levy at the Wednesday afternoon meeting.

When the 2014-15 budget was approved by the school board, Kanas said the school district would add some programs and courses, including AP courses, a new engineering program in ninth grade, and new elementary school science programs.

In her presentation last Wednesday, Pirro said homeowners in the district will pay $47.54 million of the tax levy, representing 94 percent of the total. Businesses will pay $2.18 million, 4 percent of the levy, and utilities will pay $1.18 million, 2 percent of the total. 

The district’s allowable tax cap for the 2014-15 budget was set at 2.71 percent, Pirro said. She said a strengthened tax base helped the district in increasing what it could spend.  

Pirro said in April the final budget reflected $101,720 in state aid the district had not expected to received. The additional funds, she said, would be applied to the tax levy. The East Williston district received a total of $2.61 million in state aid in the budget passed by the state Legislature, $73,458 less than it received last year.

To conserve costs, Pirro said the school district will eliminate one elementary teaching position in the 2014-15 school year due to lower student enrollment and a part-time position teaching Mandarin at the high school due to insufficient interest in the course. 

Among other cuts cited by school district officials in April were an open guidance counselor position that will not be filled, one full-time typist clerk position in the Wheatley School guidance office that also will not be filled after a mid-year retirement and one full-time and five part-time school monitor positions that will be cut districtwide. Two part-time custodial cleaning positions will also be eliminated.

Pirro has said the biggest budget drivers continue to be the same year-to-year. 

Salaries will comprise $31.34 million of the 2014-15 budget, rising .54 percent by $166,927. District costs for the teachers’ retirement system will rise more than 10 percent to $4.38 million, while costs for the employees’ retirement system are projected to rise more than 61 percent by $315,069 to $828,962. Health insurance costs will rise 3.28 percent by $192,016 to more than $6 million.

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