Notes provided by:   Cindy Friedman, Sharon Grossman and Leslie Mayer

The Arlington School Committee Budget Workshop

Sunday, January 11, 2004 - 1:00 – 4:00 PM
School Committee Room – Arlington High School

Attending: All SC members were present along with Kay Donovan, Joanne Gurry, Rob Addelson, Bonnie Bisbiscos, Diane Mahon (Selectmen rep), Alan Jones (Finance Comm rep) and several members of the public.

Several handouts were provided including: a spreadsheet on the number of elementary classrooms and usage; estimated savings from closing the Dallin during reconstruction; projected Dallin School debt service; cost comparison of LABBB (in-district special needs program) vs. comparable out-of-district special education day school programs; and an evaluation of the reuse potential of select properties in the Town (completed in 1/2003 by the Planning & Community Development Dept.)

Discussion focused on the following points:

• Elementary Schools are at 90% capacity (the NESDEC study recommended standard for where schools should be at) – at an average class size of 21 students. There is some tweaking that can be done through redistricting to address over crowding in some schools where specially designed classrooms are being used as regular classrooms.
• Closing Dallin will increase capacity of existing schools above the 90% and the savings are estimated to be about $75k. There may be some extra savings in busing if/when town is redistricted. Because of capacity levels new schools being built would have to be built bigger which would mitigate savings in busing. It is unclear that there would be a savings in teaching staff since adding children to schools would mean more teachers were necessary in those schools. At most there would be a savings of 1 or 2 teaching staff and that is dependent on schools and number of children, etc. At present, Arlington’s enrollments continue to increase, while school closings are more typical for systems with declining enrollments.
• Kay Donovan pointed out that the elementary system in Arlington works very well (with agreement from all present) and consolidating schools would be for purely financial reasons. The current 7-school system is educationally sound, working very well and producing good results. There was some questioning of whether saving $75-100k right now is worth the turmoil that would ensue and the risk to a good system when beyond the short term, it may not be an issue.
• Everyone in attendance agreed that teachers should be paid more.
• Rob Addelson presented a Dallin financing plan that would allow the town to service the debt on the Dallin reconstruction and remain within the $34M cap voted on in the last debt exclusion. This plan will be discussed with the town treasurer and Rob will present back to the school committee.
• There was a cost comparison done of the LABBB (BIP) special ed program – currently Arlington has 10 students enrolled – to similar programs in the greater Boston Area. There is a savings of from $16k to $57k per pupil in servicing the students through LABBB. There was discussion about adding 2 more special ed classes in Arlington for both financial savings and educational benefits to the students being served. Keeping these programs in Arlington requires that we maintain the classroom spaces to house the programs.

Student Fee Proposals (Kay Donovan)

2 handouts were provided including: Recommended Fees (2004-2005) and a spreadsheet of proposed sport fee per student per sport

Discussion focused on the following points:

• Two different proposals for student activity fees were presented – one that looked at instituting an athletic fee for individual sports and one that looked at sports, clubs and instrumental music as clusters. A recommendation was made by the superintendent to charge $225/yr to participate in sports, $50/yr as a club/activity fee and $225/yr for instrumental music – an increase of $50 over FY03-FY04. The family cap would be at $500. All students would be encouraged to participate regardless of financial status. An increased amount of CDBG funds would be solicited to help defray costs for those who can’t pay.
• The Full day kindergarten fee was recommended to remain at $1500/yr.
• There was a recommendation that students using bus transportation to and from Arlington schools be charged $3.00 a day (except for students in private placement). The impact of this is dependent on decisions regarding the Dallin reconstruction and redistricting. There was also a recommendation that the schools develop a RFP for selling advertising on the outside of the buses, to defray cost and that EDNETS be contacted for further information on their program – receiving money through the personal use of credit cards.

Overview of FY 05 Proposed Budget/ Grant Reporting (Rob Addelson)

Handouts included: FY2004 Grant report; preliminary 1st draft budget worksheet; and recommendations for elementary specialists for 2004-2005

Discussion focused on the following points:

• FY 03-04 Grant report presented. Arlington currently gets about $3.1 million in grant money that funds 59.9 teaching positions. A description of each grant and its amount was provided.
• An initial budget worksheet for FY 04-FY05 was discussed. As the teacher’s contract is still under negotiation at this time, that salary impact to the budget is unknown and will be dealt with separately. The assumptions, under which the preliminary budget was created relating to the elementary level specialists, were presented. The budget is being looked at for restoration of programs at each level. The worksheet was reviewed and a next draft is being worked on.

Discussion of Programs (Committee)

A handout on selected components of the FY’05 budget, grouped by Arlington High School, Ottoson Middle School, Elementary Schools and Administration program items

Discussion focused on the following:

• The School Committee members went through an exercise of ranking programs and positions from 1-4 (where 1= absolutely critical/work for funding; 2 = very important/could be modified; 3 = important/funded by outside sources; 4 = don’t feel is important/would vote to eliminate), which were previously cut at each level (K-5, middle and high school) to determine the order of importance for restoring or retaining them. Members of the public were asked to fill out the sheet and submit their input also.

SPOT offers these notes as a service to the community.
SPOT is an organization of concerned parents and community members who are interested in full, equitable and sound financing of our public education.
We regret any errors and omissions.