SCHOOLS Work to Close Yawning Budget Breach
Halfway through fiscal year 2014 (July 2013 to June 2014), Groton Dunstable Regional School District finds itself in a financial bind that will put major stress on this year's budget and impact budget preparations for fiscal year 2015.
The school district and School Committee learned last July (at the beginning of fiscal 2014) that inaccurate salary data for several categories of employees were used to build the district's fiscal 2013 budget and that inaccurate salary data were carried forward to the fiscal 2014 budget. As a result, the spending obligations of the district exceeded the budgeted amounts and left the district scrambling to close a major deficit in their budget.
The budget gap, estimated to be in excess of $400,000, will not be fully known until an audit is completed on the fiscal 2013 and fiscal 2014 budgets, Groton-Dunstable Regional School System Superintendent Anthony Bent said the deficit will be more than $400,000 and the School Committee and adminisrators will have a better idea of the magnitude of the problem after the audits are completed.
To put this gap of at least $400,000 in perspective, it represents approximately one - two percent of the District's total budget of $33 million. In preparing the town's operating budget for fiscal 2015, Groton's Town Manager had budgeted approximately a $400,000 increase in Groton's assessment - roughly a 2-1/2 percent increase.
Interim Superintendent Anthony Bent has taken several actions to plug the budget gap, all actions based on minimizing direct impact on students, avoiding cutting direct classrom expenditures. The following actions have been taken:
Laying off staff in administrative and custoidal departments
Reducing staff hours in adminstrative and custodial departments
Reducing Superinendent's salary by 20 percent for remainder of contract.
Instituting district-wide hiring freeze.
Instituting district-wide spending freeze.
In addition, part of the gap will probably be made up by tapping the schools 'Excess and Deficiency' Fund. Suprintendent Bent is likely to recommend to the School Committee that part of the shortfall be bridged by using some of these funds.
Superintendent Believes Deficit Problem Resolved
In a brief phone conversation this week, Dr. Bent said the district essentially has resolved the fiscal 2014 shortfall with the actions taken so far. Dr. Bent said he does not foresee taking any more action on this deficit and any further adjustments will be accounting procedures under the guidance of the State Deprtment of Revenue.
Dr. Bent said the issues brought to his attention under the fiscal 2013 and fiscal 2014 budgets will likely impact preparation of the fiscal 2015 budget. He noted that use of incorrect salary data will have to be corrected in the fiscal 2015 budget to ensure that the district meets its financial obligations. Audited information should be known sometime in early January.
In all his years working as a superintendent, Dr. Bent commented that this is the first year he had to work on three budgets at the same time: Budgets for Fiscal Year '13, '14 and '15.
