WASHBURN, Maine — The area school district received some troubling news last week, and officials are looking at how to deal with a potential loss of nearly $400,000 in state subsidies.
The annual estimate of the state subsidy for the district was “not good news,” according to Mike McIntosh, chair of the School Administrative District 45 board of directors, during an emergency board meeting Feb. 24. “We’re looking at a possible drop of $388,000. We were expecting $63,000 of that due to a problem with our gifted/talented program not being funded for the current year.”
But the district, which serves Washburn, Perham and Wade, was informed an additional $300,000-plus in funding would not be coming because, according to the state, “we were not properly recording some of our financial transactions related to our day treatment program,” McIntosh said. He added, however, “We were following the procedures we’ve been following for years. We’ve been audited, we’ve been checked, everything had been OK’d. The rules changed at some point, and we weren’t informed and did not know.
“Our question now is, ‘Why does that make any difference because we’re getting reimbursed for our expenditures?’ The superintendent will be looking into it, and hopefully we can persuade the Department of Education to look into it again,” he said
Superintendent Ed Buckley said he expects the shortfall will be closer to $183,000.
“When you look at what we get from MaineCare money this year, and what we get for state funding this year, we’re only off around $183,000,” he said. “That’s what we really have to look at to make up.
“We know that a lot of teachers at the high school are teaching less than 50 students; we can’t live with that. We’re going to have to increase class sizes and we’re going to have to change a lot of things,” Buckley said. “We may not offer as many electives. If the eighth grade moves [to the high school], that would likely save at least a teacher and a half, which would probably save us between $60,000-$80,000. There are other things we can change. Our challenge right now would be to come up with somewhere in the neighborhood of $185,000 — $200,000 at most — maybe as low as $150,000.”
Buckley said the district has been fortunate in recent years and has not had to make drastic cuts.
“If you look around you, we’ve been awful lucky. Fort Kent cut 20-some positions last year. They cut their elementary music,” he said. “Every school in The County is in the same boat as you folks are. We haven’t had any of those cuts. The board has been very adamant that we don’t fire people who have been with us a long time. We will have to look very hard at places where we can cut the budget, but I don’t think you’re going to have to cut $388,000.”
During the public comment portion of the meeting, Donna Turner, selectwoman of Wade, asked whether the board was planning to raise taxes as a way to recover costs.
“You’re trying to appeal this, but if it doesn’t go your way,” she said. “Are you coming back to the towns and asking for this money? What are you going to do on your end before coming back to us because this would be a huge hit for us?”
“This is the second day that we’ve had these numbers in front of us,” McIntosh said. “We did not anticipate this was going to happen, so we’re really coming to you tonight to let you folks know the problem exists … at the same time that we’re being informed. We have not formulated a detailed response at this time. It’s only the second day.”
David Heald, of Perham, wondered whether tuitioning the high school students to another district would be a viable cost-saving option.
“I know that’s not something you want to talk about, but the bottom line is, in future years, it may warrant some research on that,” he said.
Recognizing that the bulk of the $300,000 decrease is the result of a community review that was completed two months ago, which “discovered a discrepancy in how we were accounting for some of our special ed funds,” McIntosh said the district will challenge that figure.
“We don’t think that’s going to be the final number; however, we’re going to proceed as if it is the final number until we know differently,” he said. “For that reason — because this is a substantial amount of money — we thought it would be useful to start right off and get the information out at a public board meeting and make sure that all board members and interested members of the public and municipal officials are aware of the situation.”
Board member Janet Grieco said the funding formulas used by the Department of Education in every state in the Northeast vary “because their standards change based very much on political climates.”
“That’s something that we are unable to control,” she said. “The only thing that we can do is try to make the best decisions and remediate that. Some communities have chosen not to rely on state funding and privatize their community schools. Maybe that’s an option.”
Buckley said the district has a lot of work to do in the coming months.
“Before we go to the voters, we’ve got to make sure that we’ve cut everything possible,” he said. “We’ve got to run a tight ship before we go to the voters and start asking them for money.”
The next regular SAD 45 board meeting will be held at 7 p.m. Tuesday, March 10, in the David J. Lyon Washburn District Elementary School cafeteria.