The Northampton Area School District Board of Education has voted to limit the percentage of a tax increase for the 2026-27 district budget. NASD school directors voted unanimously 9-0 at the Dec. 1 board meeting to approve a resolution \u201cindicating the board of school directors will not raise the rate of any tax for the 2026-27 fiscal year by more than its index.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Pennsylvania Department of Education has not announced the Act 1 Index for NASD for its 2026-27 budget.<\/p>\n
The Act 1 Index sets a maximum property tax increase for school districts. The index is calculated as an inflation-based cap by averaging wage and employment cost increases.<\/p>\n
For the 2025-26 NASD budget, school directors voted 9-0 at the Jan. 13 meeting to approve a resolution to not raise the tax rate more than the state-mandated 2025-26 Act 1 Index, which was 4.8%.<\/p>\n
At the June 14 meeting, school directors voted 5-4 to approve a district real estate tax increase of 4% for the 2025-26 budget of $140,659.873.<\/p>\n
The district real estate tax is 58.52 mills, which was an increase of 2.25 mills from 56.27 mills.<\/p>\n
Based on the average district assessment of $63,000, the real estate tax bill for the 2025-26 budget increased $137.47, from $3,438.10 to $3,575.57.<\/p>\n
At the Dec. 1 board meeting, NASD Superintendent of Schools Joseph S. Kovalchik said he expects he and NASD Business Administrator Craig Neiman will unveil the 2026-27 NASD budget at the next school board meeting, set for 6:30 p.m. Jan. 12, 2026, in the auditorium at Northampton Area High School, 1619 Laubach Ave.<\/p>\n
\u201cBudget time is right around the corner,\u201d Kovalchik said, adding, \u201cMr. Neiman and I will have the first (budget) presentation in January.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can\u2019t say the same about the state budget, which was four-and-one-half months overdue,\u201d Kovalchik said, emphasizing, \u201cWe will be on time and approve it (NASD budget) in June.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pennsylvania and its school districts are required to approve budgets by June 30. Pennsylvania\u2019s 2025-26 state budget was approved and signed into law by Gov. Josh Shapiro Nov. 12.<\/p>\n
Kovalchik\u2019s report to the school board at the Dec. 1 meeting included an agenda item update on the East Allen Elementary School project.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019ve just about enclosed the building. Things are moving right along,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019ll get the board out there for a visit.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI drive by the project regularly, and it looks very impressive,\u201d board President John Becker said.<\/p>\n
Referring to an agenda item update about Moore Elementary School, Becker said, \u201cI know the facilities (committee) is working on how to handle it.\u201d<\/p>\n
In other business at the Dec. 1 meeting, school directors voted 9-0 to approve the following.<\/p>\n
\u2022 Kyleigh Straub, long-term substitute kindergarten teacher at Lehigh Elementary School, effective Oct. 2-March 20, 2026, at $63,655, prorated, with no benefits<\/p>\n
\u2022 Retirement of Theodore Martin, NAHS Spanish teacher, effective last school day 2025-26 school year<\/p>\n
\u2022 Retirement of Joan Cottone, 10-month secretary at Franklin Elementary School, effective last day of contract 2025-26 school year<\/p>\n
\u2022 Retirement of Sharon Mondschein, 12-month secretary at administration building, effective April 6, 2026<\/p>\n
\u2022 Contract for Robert Holler, NASD 10-month school police officer, from July 1, 2026 to June 30, 2030, at $55,381<\/p>\n
\u2022 Jason Keppel, head custodian at East Allen Elementary School, effective June 1, 2026, at $30.27 per hour and additional $2 per hour rate as head custodian, with benefits<\/p>\n
\u2022 Compensation for department coordinators, district coordinators, middle school subject leaders and team leaders, effective for 2025-26 school year<\/p>\n
\u2022 Revised mentor and inductee list for 2025-26 school year, including mentors and stipend payments<\/p>\n
\u2022 Mandatory attendance of school security officer Stephen Milkovits and security guard Dawn Gutkowski at the basic school resource officer training course in Archbald, Lackawanna County, Dec. 15-19, at approximately $1,950 plus mileage, included in approved 2025-26 NASD security budget<\/p>\n
\u2022 Jessica Pretopapa, approximately 35 students and three or four chaperones to travel to New York City, April 23, 2026, for National Honor Society educational field trip at cost to district to not exceed $628, covered in 2025-26 board-approved budget<\/p>\n
\u2022 Policy 113, special education (revised); policy 113.3, screening and evaluations for students with disabilities (revised); policy 122.1, non-school-sponsored student groups (new); policy 122.2, club sports (policy number change only); policy 123, interscholastic athletics (revision); and policy 801, public records (attachment revision only)<\/p>\n
\u2022 Affiliation agreement with Valdosta State University and NASD, effective Dec. 2<\/p>\n
At the Dec. 1 meeting, school directors voted 8-1 to approve the following.<\/p>\n
\u2022 Clubs for 2025-26 school year \u2014 Borough Elementary School: The Cement Mixers and Club Prep for Success; Moore Elementary School: Math Magicians; Northampton Area Middle School: Heart and Sole; NAHS: Indoor Color Guard, Club America and Aeronautics Club<\/p>\n
Before the vote on clubs, school Director Joshua Harris said, \u201cI\u2019m going to be voting \u2018no\u2019 from a financial standpoint.\u201d<\/p>\n
None<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Northampton Area School District Board of Education has voted to limit the percentage of a tax increase…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":63666,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[153,155,154],"class_list":{"0":"post-63665","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bethlehem","8":"tag-bethlehem","9":"tag-bethlehem-headlines","10":"tag-bethlehem-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63665","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=63665"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63665\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63666"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63665"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63665"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63665"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}