Charleroi’s budget won’t cut programs

CHARLEROI – Charleroi Area School Board on Tuesday unanimously approved a $23.55 million budget for 2017-18 that includes a tax increase and discussed plans to pool resources with neighboring districts for teaching and transportation.
The budget includes about $500,000 in increased spending, or 1.75 percent, from the previous budget of $23.1 million. The revenue neutral-millage rate was rebalanced at 15.2805 mills from last year’s rate of 143 mills due to Washington County’s recent reassessment and with the tax increase of .5501 mills, total millage was set at 15.8306, an increase of about 3.6 percent.
For the owner of a home assessed at $50,000, the increase would raise real estate taxes $27, to $791.
The budget includes an increase of $200,000 in employee health insurance costs and $381,000 increase in state pension contributions. Cyber school tuition also increased by $94,000. Business manager Crystal Zahand said with the total cost of cyber school tuition being close to $600,000, the district continues to make efforts to recruit students back into Charleroi Area with its internal cyberschool.
Zahand said the budget does not include any cuts to employees or services. She said savings were achieved by not filling two positions through attrition, a middle school family and consumer science teacher and a sixth-grade English teacher. Administration plans to rework the current staff to take over those responsibilities.
“We try to keep every dollar we can in the classroom,” Zahand said. Another way the district cut costs is by sharing a speech teacher with Bentworth Area School District. She said the speech teacher will be on Charleroi’s payroll and the cost will be shared with Bentworth. Zahand said the district was also able to save money by sharing transportation resources for special needs students with neighboring districts.
With “expenses going up more than the revenues,” the district has had to come up with ways to lessen the expenses, she added.
Superintendent Ed Zelich said his goal is to share transportation resources with other districts for the 2017-18 school year. He said administrators have invited multiple neighboring districts, such as Monessen, Bentworth and California, to discuss sharing transportation resources July 5.
“We have to reinvent the way we do things,” Zelich said. He said by looking for ways to be more cost-effective, money will be able to be directed to the students.
Zelich said he recently received a letter from Monessen Superintendent Dr. Leanne Spazak that discussed the possibility of sharing services and also discussed a possible merger between the two districts. Zelich said the board is open to discussion with Monessen, which is struggling with financial problems and declining enrollment.