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Advisory Committee
Meeting Minutes

Town of Hingham
Advisory Committee
February 4, 2010 Meeting Minutes
Hingham Town Hall
Present: Committee Members Seelen, Manning, Asher, Dwyer, Eldredge, Ellison, Farrell, Friedman, Innis, Johnson, Lauter, MacCune, Marwill, Mooradian, O’Meara

1. Call to order

Board of Selectmen Chair Laura Burns, School Committee Chair Christine Smith, and Advisory Committee Chair Jerry Seelen called the joint meeting to order at 8:36 PM.

2. FY 2011 School Budget Update

School Superintendent Dorothy Galo presented a School Committee proposal compatible with the Board of Selectmen’s stated FY11 budget goals.

A summary of the proposal’s financial highlights follows.

• FY10 Approved School Budget -- $36.5M
• FY11 Town Forecast for School’s Budget -- $34.6M

o Based on 5.28% cut from FY10

• FY11 Level-Services School Budget -- $37.5M

o The $1M increase from the Level-Funded budget to the Level-Services budget is driven by:

 $628K of Salary increase
 $545K of SPED increase

• Includes $462K of lost circuit-breaker reimbursement

 Offset by $162K of other line-item decreases

• The School Committee proposes bridging the $2.9M difference between the Town Forecast for School’s budget and the Level-Services budget through application of the following funding:

o Federal education stimulus signaled in March, 2009 -- $965K

 The School Committee assumes no reduction of the Town FY11 tax rate using these funds, based on its interpretation of the Federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009.
 The Board of Selectmen and the Advisory Committee will seek guidance from the Town’s financial and legal consultants on this issue.

o Federal IDEA grant funding for FY11 -- $462K

 Includes rolling over unspent FY10 IDEA funds

o Reduction of Town capital spending by $1M and allocation of the remaining, budgeted $1M to the School operating budget -- $1M
o Cost reduction by attrition of 6 teaching positions and 1 non-teaching position, student-fee increases, and other budget reductions -- $511K

 The proposed reduction of staff by attrition would eliminate unemployment compensation expense

• Proposed FY11 School Committee Budget -- $37M

In response to a question from Selectman Bruce Rabuffo, Town Administrator Kevin Paicos indicated that the latest estimate of FY11 New Growth has dropped from $800K to $550K.

Members of the Committee asked numerous questions and made suggestions to the School Department and School Committee regarding potential cost savings and efficiencies.

3. Adjourn

The joint meeting was adjourned at 11:00 PM.

Respectfully submitted,
Jonathan R. Asher, Secretary