SALEM TOWNSHIP — Regional School Unit 58 directors and selectmen Thursday got their first look at a proposed $9.35 million budget for 2017-18.

Superintendent Susan Pratt said she could not forecast final figures without anticipated revenues, but based on last year’s figures, she projected a small increase.

“This budget draft reflects an increase of 1.78 percent, or approximately $164,000, over the adopted 2016-17 budget,” she said.

Although this is the last year of the the $96,971 Strong Elementary School construction loan payments, Pratt noted that several district projects require urgent funding. Repaving driveways and parking lots can be financed over time, but voters must consider approving $100,000 to start on the Phillips Elementary School lot.

Other projects on the list include roof repair and removal of a fuel tank at Kingfield Elementary School and requirements to meet the Americans with Disabilities Act.  

Pratt said the Maine Department of Education subsidizes the state’s school systems, based on the valuation of the contributing towns, and the number of students and teachers, among other criteria.

She said few, if any, Maine schools are able to teach all children in all school districts within the required funding model. Additionally, RSU 58 schools have difficulty meeting the teacher-to-student ratio, because the small student population is spread over a wide rural area, including the state’s unorganized territories. 

Pratt said the Legislature has not established a 2017 budget, and although she had hoped to learn the projected subsidy amount before the board meeting, those Department of Education figures had not been released.

RSU 58’s costs to run the three elementary schools and one high school are based on those anticipated subsidies and tuition revenues for the 200 students who live in the unorganized territories or in communities outside the district.

Although salaries are a big part of the annual cost, the goal is to educate students, she said.

“Over 64 percent of our budget goes into our classroom,” she told the board and the four selectmen who attended the preliminary overview.
  
The state has transferred to school districts nearly half of the cost of paying for teachers’ retirement over the past three years, so RSU 58’s share will increase in the coming year. 

According to the Maine School Management Association, the costs school districts have to pay for their teachers are projected to go up 18 percent in the next biennium, an increase that will raise the current $38 million statewide contribution to $46 million, starting in 2017-18.

Retirement costs started the shift from state to local levels in the Legislature’s 2013 biennial budget. The cost to districts was $29 million, but increased by $9 million in the last biennial budget. The 18 percent projected hike is an increase of $8 million in the 2017-18 school year. 

With such uncertainty at the state level, Pratt said, she has instituted a “soft freeze” in the current budget.