By Natalie De La Garza
Staff Writer
CARIBOU — While the school board members agreed that they will try to hold the upcoming budget the same $18,718,271 as current, they also acknowledged that goal may be unrealistic.
The board met on Nov. 22 for a very preliminary budget workshop that identified the board’s main goals for the upcoming year — things like maintaining the buildings, continuing to support the vision for the RSU 39 drafted by community members, and keeping technology current.
While few figures are set for the upcoming budget, Superintendent Frank McElwain shared with the board members some information to keep in mind.
“It looks like there’s a good chance our revenue will be down, so there’s a gap, and it looks like our costs will be up a quarter million, and other costs — salaries will go up a quarter million. You’re probably at a $1 million gap before we start much of a serious conversation,” he said.
Some of the earliest tangible figures for the upcoming budget were the 13 percent increase in insurance costs that the school board faces. That translates to an $260,000 addition — over half a mil — to the roughly $3 million spent on coverage for the RSU’s 276 full-time employees
“It’s a hard thing,” McElwain said. “Here we are, we want to do all these grand things … and I just told you we’re starting in a million dollar hole. So it’s kind of doing more with $1 million less, but it’s obviously a matter of setting priorities.”
School Board Chair Cliff Rhome stated he’d like to try to maintain the mil rate and added that the only proposed budgetary increases were due to cost-of-living-type expenses.
“I don’t think you’re going to be able to keep expenditures flat, and I don’t think you’re going to be able to keep the current tax dollars. Costs are going to go up, even if you don’t add anything new,” he said.
While the board is looking for ways to keep the budget at last year’s level, they discussed how there is much of their budget they can’t control.
For instance, almost 80 percent of the RSU 39 budget is devoted to salaries and insurance/benefits.
“So really the only things we could possible play with would be 20 percent of the budget, and of that 20 percent we can’t play with all the things — like electricity (and other utility costs),” discussed school board member Dale Gordon.
Board member Kent Forbes agreed that many costs were outside of the board’s control.
“You have to turn your lights on, that’s out of your control; you’ve got to heat the building, that’s out of your control; there’s so much of it that’s out of your control, and when you get down to it … the only way we can tweak it is with these tiny little miniscule moves — I don’t know what we’re going to do,” he described.
Gordon expressed that there could be cost savings in decreasing insurance spending.
“This insurance system we’ve got for the teachers just can’t be (funded) at this level,” she said, describing the teacher’s Anthem Blue Cross insurance as the “Cadillac of plans.”
“It’s been a dream insurance, but we can’t afford to do this,” she added. “We’re going to have to cut schools, we’re going to have to cut teachers, we’re going to have to cut everything because of the insurance — is that our priority?” she questioned, “to keep the insurance the way it is, no matter what?”
As a preliminary meeting, the board also agreed that cost savings could be found by consolidating the RSU’s schools — but state funding to build a new K-8 school won’t be available any time soon.
As this was a goal-setting workshop for the school board, they did give McElwain an initial approach to the upcoming budget season.
“That goal is to stay within the current mil rate, realizing that it may be an overly optimistic goal,” McElwain summarized.
