Budget crunch time in NK, CC

A proposed $14 million budget for the next school year, now under consideration by Charles City School Board members, lists no new teaching positions and no job cuts. But school officials are asking for a 4.5 percent teacher pay raise along with $7.1 million in county money.

School Superintendent Janet Crawley unveiled the 2008-09 proposal before School Board members during a Feb. 5 meeting. Board members were scheduled to refine the document during work sessions scheduled for Feb. 7 and 12.

If approved, a first-year teacher in Charles City next year would earn $37,500, almost $1,500 more than for the current school year. The salary scale would then rise in 33 steps to a top level of $56,638.

Crawley told board members that Charles City is attempting to remain competitive in the search for qualified teachers, but noted that with pay raises anticipated in other school systems, the county is chasing a moving target. In Region I, which includes Charles City and 14 other Richmond-area school divisions, the county ranks 13th in terms of starting salary.

“Even with a 4.5 percent pay increase, I don’t anticipate our ranking in the region will increase substantially or at all,” she told the board.

Board member Royce Paige complained that the proposed pay hike is not enough.

“Teachers coming to rural schools looking to make a name for themselves are going to shop elsewhere before they come here,” he said.

In first-year teacher pay statewide for the current school year, Charles City ranks 53rd out of 132 school systems.

Crawley, meanwhile, said $5,000 has been placed in the proposed budget to help with recruiting teachers out-of-state. Searching outside Virginia is crucial for Charles City to stay competitive, she added.

The budget proposal includes $7,104,836 in county money, an increase of less than 2 percent ($134,552) above the $6.97 million schools received for this year.

Crawley mentioned that county officials requested last fall that schools and other county departments reduce current budget figures by 5 percent. Schools managed to trim $155,000. So far, she added, no word has been received concerning budget prospects for next year.

“We’ve had no conversations [with county officials] yet on whether there will be an increase, whether we’ll be level-funded, or whether there will be cuts,” she told the board.

The overall $14 million budget proposal is 6.4 percent higher than the current year’s figure of just under $13.2 million. The money, Crawley said, is needed for Charles City schools to meet state Standards of Learning (SOL) mandates and federal No Child Left Behind benchmarks. All three county schools are accredited, but only the elementary school meets full accreditation. The middle school is conditionally accredited while the high school is accredited with warning in math.

The state’s contribution, for now, is just over $5.75 million or almost 16 percent above the current year. State money is based on student enrollment numbers, and Charles City is building its budget on an anticipated student body of 867 children, the same number now enrolled in county schools.

Federal dollars, however, are showing close to a 9 percent decrease for next year and total just over $811,000.

“It is a concern that our federal dollars are decreasing,” Crawley told the board, adding that schools may be forced to reduce staff that work with federal programs or take other expense-cutting measures.

County money, meanwhile, makes up just over half of the revenue needed to fund the proposed budget. Most of the proposed bottom line, $9 million or almost 65 percent, is earmarked for instruction.

The proposed 4.5 percent pay increase applies to all school employees. Other items of note in the budget proposal are:

–Almost $14,000 to lease/purchase two buses;

–Money to cover an expected 22 percent rise in fuel costs;

–$250,000 to upgrade the schools’ heating/ventilation/air-conditioning systems;

–Just over $30,000 for school building paint work;

–$25,000 for an efficiency study to be conducted by the state;

–And $35,000 for a salary study.

Crawley told the board the salary study is needed to find ways to bring Charles City’s pay scale in line with other state localities.