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Date: 2/21/2023
LUDLOW – The School Committee and Superintendent Frank Tiano continues to prepare the fiscal year 2024 (FY24) budget for Town Meeting in the spring.
The School Committee hosted a public hearing at its Feb. 14 meeting which is something they are required to do, according to School Committee Chair Chip Harrington.
The School Committee has directed the administration to prioritize maintaining low class size, continuing its relationship with Lower Pioneer Valley Educational Collaborative, scheduling the arts; music and choir, supporting people with a focus on mental health and maintaining bus transportation costs.
“We are a service organization, and it is important to know who our students are,” Tiano added. “We have to understand the students we are dealing with, and those numbers have been changing over the last five, 10, 15 years.”
Since fiscal year 2019 (FY19), the overall enrollment of Ludlow schools has gone down by 282 students, but the cost has not decreased.
Tiano said, “That doesn’t necessarily mean there is a reduction if those students aren’t grouped together in the same grade level. You can have 100 students at Harris Brook Elementary School and 10 in each grade level does not reduce the services or staff we provide.”
Even though the overall enrollment is trending downwards, the specific populations are trending upward.
Students with English not as their first language makes up 12 percent of the school population which is a 23 percent increase since FY19. English language learners have also seen a 100 percent increase since 2019.
Ludlow schools also is made up of 37 percent of students who are considered at an economic disadvantage or low income. Forty eight percent of students are also considered high needs, which are students who fall into two of three of these categories: economically disadvantaged, English learners and students with disabilities.
“Coming through the [coronavirus] pandemic, our population has changed, and we are working hard to fit their needs,” Tiano said.
The rest of the presentation broke down major variations from last year’s budget, tuition increases, spending categories, expenses and the five-year budget history.
The biggest concern is that the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) funds have run out after three years, leading to a $1.6 million reduction to the operating budget.
A level service budget means that the same level of service to students and families that was provided the previous year without reducing staff or programs.
Increasing costs, contracts and inflation can cause level service budgets to increase the following year.
Due to certain increases in expenses, a level funded budget, or one short of a level service, typically ends in a reduction in staff or programs.
In the presentations, Tiano showed a few slides with different increases to the general fund and how much the Ludlow schools would still have to reduce their budget by.
The current general fund increase Tiano is looking for the schools to do is 3 percent, which would be a little over $2 million in reductions.
The total operating cost for the schools would be $41 million.
A budget impact example is in fiscal year 2023. There were 14 full-time employees reduced (17 impacted) due to not meeting level service budget but nine full-time employees were added back due to English language learning and special education requirements. The School Committee also agreed to use ESSER one-time funds for mandated positions.
“At the bare minimum we do not want to go backwards. Schools are expensive. In the last four fiscal years there has been budget reductions. We have spent a lot of time looking at the budget reductions and having to reduce,” Tiano said.
The schools budget takes up a majority of the overall town budget and Ludlow is right on pace with that.
For example, fiscal year 2022 saw the Ludlow schools budget take up 43 percent of the town budget, but surrounding areas school budgets average the same.
Agawam school budget was 44 percent of the overall town’s budget, East Longmeadow’s was 46 percent, Longmeadow was 46 percent and Wilbraham was 48 percent.
Tiano added, “Ludlow is not alone with budget cuts. There are multiple articles that came out in the last week with surrounding schools facing the same thing. It is a pattern, and this presentation is to break down why things must be done.”
Tiano said the next steps for the school budget is to make some final changes to the budget before having a joint meeting with the School Committee and Board of Selectmen on Feb. 28.
That meeting may be delayed because the committee agreed that it is hoping to see Gov. Maura Healey’s budget first before deciding on its final numbers. The committee is hoping her budget is released within the next couple of weeks.
Harrington let everyone know that usually the committee in years past has not voted until April or May, so they are still early in the process and can take some more time to gather more information.
To view the FY24 budget documents, visit www.ludlowps.org/school-committee.
“I will continue to work with everyone I can to help show everything we are looking at with this budget and do what is best for the town and our schools,” Tiano concluded.