{"id":15825,"date":"2025-05-05T16:07:19","date_gmt":"2025-05-05T16:07:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mytownnews.ca\/index.php\/2025\/05\/05\/board-approves-51m-proposed-budget\/"},"modified":"2025-05-05T16:07:19","modified_gmt":"2025-05-05T16:07:19","slug":"board-approves-51m-proposed-budget","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mytownnews.ca\/index.php\/2025\/05\/05\/board-approves-51m-proposed-budget\/","title":{"rendered":"Board approves $51M proposed budget"},"content":{"rendered":"

By EMILIA TEASDALE<\/strong><\/p>\n

KINDERHOOK\u2014The Ichabod Crane Board of Education held a special meeting on April 22 to approve the proposed 2025-26 school budget of $51,143,999 before the annual budget vote and school board election on May 20.<\/p>\n

The board heard the sixth budget presentation from administrators before voting. Superintendent Marie Digirolamo pointed out that though the school district\u2019s budget is ready, the state\u2019s budget was not at the time of the meeting. She said given the late state budget, the administration has made some \u201ccareful assumptions\u201d about state aid.<\/p>\n

She and Business Manager Michael Brennan started the presentation talking about how the budget process started with a $3 million gap, due mostly to an increase in health insurance costs. Ms. Digirolamo said that though cuts were made, the district\u2019s budget will continue to advance instructional programs.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese programs remain strong in this budget,\u201d she told the board.<\/p>\n

In his report, Mr. Brennan said that there was a planned decrease in overall state aid (-$112,651), historic increases in health insurance (+$1,474,611), an increase in student needs, and declining enrollment (.5%\/year over 10 years).<\/p>\n

He did point out that they were able to stay within the state mandated tax cap with the $51 million budget, which is an increase over last year of $956,986 or 1.91%. \u201cWe did our job keeping this economically feasible,\u201d he said of the budget.<\/p>\n

He said that the challenges in planning for next year\u2019s budget remain, including the uncertain state budget numbers and the rising costs of health insurance benefits.<\/p>\n

\u201cWithout a benefit solution long term, we will continue to see this trend,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Ms. Digirolamo told the board that it was time for advocacy about the increased healthcare costs. \u201cThis is unsustainable,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

As for the initial budget deficit, Mr. Brennan said it was closed with staffing reductions, which included 11 retirements, declining enrollments and \u201cright size staffing.\u201d That led to a total $1.2 million of payroll reductions. There were cuts in materials, supplies and equipment that came to a reduction of approximately $575,000.
\u201cWherever possible the use of grants was allocated to cover salary,\u201d the report says, as well as the use of $229,000 from the Reserves\/Fund Balance to balance out the budget.<\/p>\n

The superintendent said this was \u201can all hands on deck moment to close the gap\u201d and talked about the teamwork that helped pull together the budget.<\/p>\n

\u201cI appreciate the effort that went into it,\u201d said Board President Matthew Nelson, praising the district for their past financial planning. \u201cWe were able to get through this in a much better spot,\u201d he said, pointing out that some districts are going over the tax cap.<\/p>\n

The ballot on May 20 will include three candidates running for three open seats on the Board of Education (all incumbents): Elizabeth Phillips, Mr. Nelson and Meghan Lafferty Brown. There is a meet the candidates night on May 12, at 6 p.m. in the high school library.<\/p>\n

There will also be a bus purchase proposition for three large buses and one small bus at a total cost of $650,006.<\/p>\n

Also at the meeting, the board voted to allow the Board of Cooperative Educational Services of Rensselaer, Columbia and Greene Counties (BOCES) \u201cto expend the sum set forth in the 2025-26 tentative administrative budget document in the amount of $7,461,009.\u201d<\/p>\n

They also voted unanimously to elect BOCES board members Edmund Brooks (ICC), Nadine Gazzola (Taconic Hills) and Melony Spock (Chatham). The vote on David Finch (Greenville Central School District) passed 5 to 1.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By EMILIA TEASDALE KINDERHOOK\u2014The Ichabod Crane Board of Education held a special meeting on April 22 to approve the proposed 2025-26 school budget of $51,143,999 before the annual budget vote and school board election on May 20. The board heard the sixth budget presentation from administrators before voting. Superintendent Marie Digirolamo pointed out that though… Read More »Board approves $51M proposed budget<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","neve_meta_reading_time":"","_themeisle_gutenberg_block_has_review":false,"_ti_tpc_template_sync":false,"_ti_tpc_template_id":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15825","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-upstater"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mytownnews.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15825","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mytownnews.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mytownnews.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mytownnews.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15825"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mytownnews.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15825\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mytownnews.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15825"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mytownnews.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15825"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mytownnews.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15825"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}