Superintendent discusses state of schools

PALMER — If approved by the borough assembly, voters throughout the Mat-Su will be asked to decide whether to cover an anticipated $13 million Mat-Su Borough School District deficit through a sales tax proposal. MSBSD Superintendent Monica Goyette said she remains confident all parties involved will come through.

Now that legislators in Juneau have hammered out a final budget for fiscal year 2017-2018, and the borough has done the same, the district needs to make up the difference. Bottom line, Goyette noted, is that both government units “flat-funded” education for the 2017-2018 school year.

That means the state kept its base student allowance (BSA) unchanged for at $5,930 from last year’s budget. The borough assembly approved a $3.2 million funding increase for the upcoming school year, which was vetoed by borough Mayor Vern Halter. Goyette said the district was actually penalized financially by the state for a projected 300 student enrollment increase for 2017-2018. Based on MSBSD data, the district spent a total of $12,645 per student this past school year and will reduce that to $12,016 for the upcoming school year.

“Because of the state foundation formula, $1.9 million was shifted from the state to the required local contribution,” Goyette said adding flat funding from the borough doesn’t account for the cost shift.

Earlier this year, the MSBSD Board of Education passed a resolution asking the borough to consider a sales tax on all non-residential goods sold in the Mat-Su. The assembly upped that a percentage point and is expected to hold the first public hearing at its Tuesday, Aug. 1 regular meeting. Goyette said the school board is scheduled to finalize a resolution for a 2-percent request at a special July 26 session.

The request would cap the borough’s annual district contribution at $50 million. In its most recent budget, the borough’s total allotment came in at approximately $57.5 million. Goyette said based on the most current data, the district would realize about $9 million in additional revenues for each one percent sales tax increase.

Goyette said the board and administration has worked hard to prioritize where the additional revenues would go. First is to reduce the pupil to teacher ratio (PTR) which it increased by up to two students—depending on grade level—to eat up some of the expected shortfall. The second is to reduce the increased student activities fee which was also hiked. Student activities include extracurricular items such as sports, clubs, and trips. The third goal is to increase the district’s personalized learning opportunities.

“We did a survey with the public,” Goyette said in explaining the three main goals. “One area where we said ‘no’ to a decrease was in school safety.”

To come up with the balanced budget by June 30, which is required by state law, the board approved reductions in the following areas and includes the anticipated savings: PTR increase, $2.8 million; non-certified staffing reductions, $2.8 million; certified staffing reductions, $2.3 million, department and school-based budget reductions, $1.9 million; student activity reductions, 0.8 million; salary contingency reduction, 0.4 million, substitute allocation reduction, $0.3 million; and executive salary reductions, $0.1 million.

The reductions include more than 76 fewer teaching posts—more than 15.5 in special education; more than a dozen positions in student and instruction support services; almost 11 posts in administration support; almost 19 operation and maintenance employees; one full-time curriculum specialist, an administrative secretary; and a 15 percent cut to department budgets, a 20 percent cut to district coaching posts and a 13 percent reduction to travel and ice rink rentals.

In addition, the district has been able to save $1.2 million in health insurance renewals, and another $0.4 million in transportation and food service subsidies. Goyette agreed to a four-percent salary cut and other executive staff will see a two-percent pay reduction.

School administrators have noted at past meetings that the MSBSD is at the bottom of the state’s “Big Five” per pupil funding list at $2,924. Fairbanks comes in fourth at $4,035 followed by Anchorage at $4,393, Juneau at $5,418 and Kenai tops the list at just under $5,500, per student. Of the state’s 19 officially recognized boroughs, eight implement a sales tax. Some of those utilized derived funds to augment school district budgets.

Goyette said if approved by the borough assembly, the district is hoping to get the question on the Oct. 3 borough election.

“It’s going to be tight,” Goyette said.

She said if the proposal doesn’t make it on the ballot, there is a chance that voters could decide the outcome in a special election. Goyette said the district estimates it will take two to three months from the time of approval before the district could begin collecting taxes.

“Regardless, we will be starting the school year with current budget reductions (in place) and we’ll look to try and solve class sizes,” said Goyette.

Goyette said the district is prohibited from spending taxpayer money on the initiative.

“We can only do information-based presentations,” Goyette said. “I will go to the public. If folks want to invite us for a presentation, I’ll be there. I’m starting to attend city council and community council meetings. I’m excited to go out and explain things.”

The superintendent said any scheduled informational meeting dates will be posted on the school’s website at www.matsuk12.us .

Although the district has “sucked up” the 2017-2018 school year budget with the above implemented changes, Goyette said if its funding sources and levels remain unchanged, board members and the administration will have to chop a projected $3.5 million from the budget in 2018-19 school year and six million the year after that.

“The foundation of a great community is great schools,” said Goyette. “We believe one of the reasons the Mat-Su continues to grow is the quality of its educational opportunities.”

Any community group wishing to have Goyette make a presentation can call the administrative offices at 907-746-9200.

Contact reporter Chris Ford at 352-2270 or chris.ford@frontiersman.com