Public school leaders in Lackawanna County are concerned the lack of payments from a late state budget will affect their operations.<\/p>\n
Administrators say they are relying on other sources to fund their districts but worry the four-month-late budget will cause them to make decisions that could affect students, faculty and taxpayers.<\/p>\n
Old Forge School District Superintendent Christopher Gatto outlined the struggles of his district in a letter to Republican lawmakers last week. He said the approximately $4 million in state funding the district hasn\u2019t received from the state represents roughly 40% of its annual state allocation.\n<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile the Commonwealth continues to earn interest on funds that have not yet been allocated, districts like ours are being forced to take out Tax Anticipation Notes just to make payroll and cover operations,\u201d he wrote. \u201cWe are paying interest on borrowed money that we never budgeted for, while the state benefits from holding the very funds owed to our students. The state\u2019s accounts are accruing interest while small districts like Old Forge are draining reserves and borrowing to stay open. Every day that passes without resolution deepens that inequity and drives up local costs.\u201d<\/p>\n
Public entities like school districts have the ability to take out a specific kind of loan, called a tax revenue anticipation note, that is paid back with future tax revenue. They typically are paid back within a year.<\/p>\n
Gatto said in the letter that the district\u2019s limited tax base and rising needs make raising $4 million impossible, adding 23% of students require special education services, there are 60 English language learners in the district, and safety and mental health concerns are growing. He said the district is delaying intervention programs, freezing positions and deferring maintenance to remain solvent.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese choices weaken the very foundation of public education that both parties claim to defend,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n
Gatto said in a phone conversation Wednesday that the district has had to prioritize paying salaries, benefits and utilities and hold off on paying bills from vendors that are nonessential.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re working through the bills and we\u2019re trying to pay them as we can,\u201d he said. \u201cbut there are a lot of vendors that we have had to put on hold and not pay them.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said officials have explained the lack of a state budget to vendors and most have been understanding. Officials are also looking at freezing professional programs for teachers that take place after school.<\/p>\n
To stay afloat, the board agreed to take out a $1.5 million tax anticipation note last month to fill the void left by the lack of state funding. Gatto said that money will get the district through to the holiday season. He worries the district will have to either take out another note or increase the amount in the current one if a budget isn\u2019t approved before then.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe one thing that is completely discouraging is that we\u2019re not hearing much coming out of Harrisburg, and right now\u00a0the money that they have that should be coming to us is earning interest in Harrisburg\u2019s coffers while we sit here and we have to take out tax anticipation notes and pay interest on those that we did not budget for,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Lakeland School District, which is waiting for around $3.4 million from the state, also took out a $3 million tax anticipation note.<\/p>\n
Superintendent Marc Wyandt said revenue from the district\u2019s fund balance and local taxes has allowed officials not to cut programs but he anticipates they may have to consider doing so if a budget isn\u2019t approved.<\/p>\n
\u201cShould this drag on further, at some point in the not-too-distant future, we will definitely be curtailing programs that will impact opportunities for our students,\u201d he said. \u201cThe real impact is that our students only get one senior year or one junior year and a lot of these opportunities, while they may be recurring in school districts, students themselves may only be getting one opportunity to participate in a lot of these programs, and so anytime you enact a freeze or a cut to programs, the impact on students is profound.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wyandt said only supplies that are critical to school operations are being purchased and the district is not making purchases beyond that.<\/p>\n
Administrators in the Valley View School District said real estate taxes, which are received between August and December, are keeping them and other districts in the state afloat.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re getting all of our real estate tax money now but the concern is\u00a0there\u2019s no idea when this budget is going to pass and how long it\u2019s going to go on for,\u201d Business Manager Corey Castellani said. \u201cOnce we start hitting the point where the real estate money starts slowing down, I think a lot of school districts are going to be in the same situation and\u00a0it\u2019s really going to start affecting the day-to-day operations of the district.\u201d<\/p>\n
Superintendent Brian Durkin said if the state budget isn\u2019t approved, they will have to look at prioritizing funding for education and safety of students and hold off on nonessential items like field trips.<\/p>\n
\u201cRight now we\u2019re keeping everything status quo, we\u2019re doing everything tight, we\u2019re looking at things coming through, is it critical for the education of our students,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re doing no wasteful spending whatsoever.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the Scranton School District, administrators already cut after-school and before-school tutoring for students and professional development classes for teachers at the start of the school year, and they are not authorizing overtime. This will ensure the district can keep paying its teachers and keep the lights on through the end of the calendar year.<\/p>\n
Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro proposed a $51.4 billion budget in February, up from $48.3 billion last year. Much of the proposed increase accounts for rising Medicaid costs, along with continued aid for poor school districts and more money for mass transit. However, Republicans who control the state Senate have balked at such an increase.<\/p>\n
While it isn\u2019t the first time state lawmakers have missed the June 30 deadline \u2014 Pennsylvania\u2019s budget has been late every year since Shapiro took office \u2014 this year marks the longest impasse during the governor\u2019s tenure. Recent impasses have been resolved by the fall, allowing schools to obtain state funding by the time students return. However, this year\u2019s stalemate has stretched two months into the school year, forcing an increasing number of districts to make difficult funding decisions.<\/p>\n
The impact is being felt especially hard in districts that serve poorer areas, which have less robust tax bases and tend to get a bigger percentage of their budgets from the state.<\/p>\n
Both Wyandt and Gatto are calling on the Legislature to pass the budget. Gatto concluded his letter to lawmakers urging the state Senate leadership to pass a continuing appropriation or interim budget, to immediately release education funds and fulfill the 2016 Commonwealth Court mandate by fully implementing the adequacy formula that corrects funding inequities.<\/p>\n
Wyandt said the district is calling on the Legislature to approve a budget that fairly funds all school districts and includes priorities such as cyber charter school reform.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt the heart of this is students who are impacted in a profound way by this budget impasse,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Spotlight PA contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Public school leaders in Lackawanna County are concerned the lack of payments from a late state budget will…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":19987,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[227,201,182,139,28,178,180,179],"class_list":{"0":"post-19986","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-scranton","8":"tag-education","9":"tag-lackawanna-county","10":"tag-local-news","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-pennsylvania","13":"tag-scranton","14":"tag-scranton-headlines","15":"tag-scranton-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19986","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19986"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19986\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19987"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}