Letter to the Editor: Taxpayer group pushes for reduction to a 1% school budget increase

April 16, 2010
by Jim McCauley

Dear Editor,

We appreciated the opportunity to present our views to the Chappaqua Central School Board in a civil and professional manner last Tuesday evening. Nonetheless, we are still not satisfied that the 2010-2011 Budget and Tax increases are as low as they can go.

Although the 1.9% budget increase – which translates into a 2.32% tax increase for New Castle residents and 12.41% for Mt. Pleasant residents – may seen reasonable and small by comparison to the past decades’ increases, they come on top of the 8.6% annual average budget increase over the past decade and will add to the financial pain that all of us expect to face in the next few budget cycles. So we reiterate: not more than 1% budget increase.

We would prefer that the Board and Administration find cuts to programs and costs that are permanent, but would be satisfied if more of the board’s $18 million reserve funds were used to limit increases. We learned at the April 13 meeting that there would be operating surplus of over $1.6 million at the end of this budget year. The Administration stated that a portion of it was already being applied to reduce the 2010-11 budget increase. We thank the Administration for being fiscally responsible and appreciate their efforts to save taxpayers’ money.

We ask the Board to use all of the available operating surplus to reduce the tax levy for the 2010-11 school budget. We realize that not all the Board fully agrees with this proposal and that they have listened and acted on earlier suggestions. We hope they will continue to listen.

Thank you for your attention to this important matter.

Sincerely,  

Jim McCauley

Co-Chairman New Castle Citizens for Responsible Education—click to view our website.