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Date: 3/23/2017
WILBRAHAM – A Budget Roundtable Meeting on March 20 at Minnechaug Regional High School revealed the proposed Hampden-Wilbraham Regional School District (HWRSD) budget for fiscal year 2018 could yield cuts to staff.
According to a slideshow presented by Superintendent Albert Ganem Jr. at the meeting, while the budget is getting a 1.17 percent increase over the budget for FY17, that may not be enough to save 7.4 full-time equivalent (FTE) teaching positions, 10 FTE paraprofessional positions, and 0.6 FTE administration positions.
According to the slideshow detailing the proposed budget, such a cut in staff would save the Hampden-Wilbraham School District $704,000 in what is, so far, a $46.5 million budget.
According to the slideshow, another possible method of saving money in the proposed budget for FY18 is to move the Early Childhood Education classes over to Mile Tree Elementary School, which would save the district $30,000.
The HWRSD budget took the bulk of the attention of the meeting, with a small percentage of the meeting devoted to the towns of Hampden and Wilbraham giving details on municipal budgets and what could possibly be allocated towards the school district.
Ganem later told Reminder Publications he was unable to comment because numbers presented were part of a proposed budget. A completed budget was not available as of press time, but was presented at a public hearing on March 22.