001Mhm. >> All right, thank you everybody for coming to Germantown Central School District's 2026 2027 budget hearing. Um So, our mission for Germantown improve student achievement, graduate all students, and promote student social emotional wellness. Vision of Germantown, Germantown School District is a comprehensive rural public school district that provides opportunity, resources, environment, and instructions so that all students may be pro- productive, successful, independent, responsible, and contributing mem- members of our global society. So, today we're going to talk about the New York State adopted uniform voting day, but our budget process and what we go through, the district goals, our district success and continued academic growth, student needs and challenges that we see. We're going to look at the budget in a summary, tax levy, the budget as a three-part budget, budget vote, contingent budget, and then
002our Board of Education elections. So, New York State adopted uniform voting day. So, New York State districts have a vote that's held on annually on the third Tuesday in May. New York State school district budget votes require public hearing, which is what we're doing right now. It provides the community with additional opportunities to learn about the district's upcoming budget, and that the vote will be next Tuesday on May 19th. So, our budget process is an ongoing process. We start this in early fall. Uh requires input from our faculty, staff, administrators, before we even go to the board. Working with key district personnel stakeholders to identify educational needs for the districts in upcoming school years. In January, we review what we call rollover budget, looking at all of our current expenses, current contracts, and rolling those
003over into the next school year. And what that cost would look like. Internally, we review each department, discuss programs, personnel, recruitment projections. With preliminary data, we develop our process and spending plan that meets and identifies the needs while being fiscally responsible. There we go. So, we held a budget workshop in September. Every month from September through now, on the second of meeting of every month, uh we have those posted on our website. We presented a rollover budget in January to the board, a non-instructional budget in February, and our instructional budget in early March. We projected revenues We projected revenues and presented in late March, along with the BOE budget workshops. Our final budget was presented at both April meetings. Uh it was formally adopted on April 22nd by the board. So, in the Germantown district,
004we have three primary goals. Our first goal is to provide a safe, inclusive, welcoming environment for everybody within our school community. The second goal that we have is to promote community engagement. And our third goal is to continue to develop innovative and engaging pre-K through 12 curriculum instruction. So, on our first goal of providing a safe, inclusive, welcoming environment for all, some of our key things that we have been working on is increasing the student voice in the high school. We do this through some new clubs that we've have. They've become more engaged and becoming more integrated within the school community and our decision-making. Also, too, we have been focusing heavily on branding in our designs so that we have greater visibility to hopefully attract more students to the district. So, how do we know
005if things are working? We do attract our attendance. Our attendance has improved, especially in the high school for this year. Um we do look at participation in extracurricular activities. We do have more clubs than I activities offered this year for students of all ages, so our attendance has increased in those areas. We have seen a decline in our behavioral referrals this year. And there has been a decline in our dropout rate. Our second goal is to enhance the engagement of the school community. I want to highlight the importance of our PTSA. They have been heavily involved and proactive this year in establishing new events for our students and our community. And that has promoted the engagement of the community overall. We have been providing monthly budget workshops since September to try to draw in the
006community and make the financial work that we do much more transparent to the community. Also, too, we work a lot of time looking at analysis of our data to make sure that our activities are diverse and providing different in areas of interest to all students across the board. So, indicators of that success, uh we do see more interaction with our parents via Parent Square. We have put a big effort this year into uh communicating um with more intense effort on a more consistent basis. We have seen greater community attendance at our school events uh because we have a greater variety of those this year. And also, um we do take a look at student engagement within the instruction, and we have made observations and we have data to support the fact that that engagement has
007increased based upon uh the adoption of some new curriculums within our curriculum this year. And our final goal is to continue to develop stronger curriculum within our pre-K 12 uh instruction and assessment area. Specifically, we have been focusing upon uh the grading standards-based grading in the high school so that all students have stronger feedback coming from our teachers so that they can perform at a higher, more successful rate. Additionally, we have been focusing upon a portrait of a graduate and preparing for that to make sure that our classwork in the high school and lower elementary and middle school uh is more interactive and focused upon portrait of a graduate. There we go. There we go. Let's continue on. Let's continue. Sure. So, we continue also to focus upon our co-teaching uh initiatives that we have
008put in place last year. So, how do we know if that's working? We're very proud of our 100% graduation rate for seniors. We anticipate that we'll continue again yet this year. Um we are looking for continued strong growth on our both our 3-8 assessments as well as our region assessments as well. We have just concluded our 3-8 assessments. We feel that they went well. We'll wait until usually late summer or early fall to begin to get those results. So, again, some of the highlights that we have been focusing upon, we are a top-performing district in our New York State 3-8 assessments, particularly at the early entry grade levels. And I think this provides strong support for the fact that the work we've been doing over the past 3 or 4 years with our new science
009of reading program is making a difference. Students are performing better. We look forward to those growth scores increasing each year. Our attendance has improved this year. We improved this year. We have had a lot of illness, which has resulted in lengthier absences, especially in the elementary building. But, in the high school building, we've seen a strong increase in attendance. Additionally, some of our rankings here that we can be proud of are especially our third grade. We placed first within all of the region, above New York State, well above the Newark region in all both ELA and math. We're very proud of those scores. Our high school Regents exams have places in the first, second, and third place rankings among all of the schools in our region. We're very proud of those scores. So, we have
010some new and continued initiatives. Primarily, we are in our first year of our new math curriculum that is designed for K through 8. This alignment we expect will produce more robust student understanding of mathematics and the conceptual learning behind that. Also to we continue to focus upon the next gen science needs for the upcoming years. We have the new test state test that we just finished this week which is kind of bringing that all into place. So that'll be an area of focus for us as well. And we continue to support our staff with all of this new learning around the new math initiative ICT programs our social emotional learning through structured professional learning and development. And then any of those continued initiatives again, we are considering to exploring new pathways for our high school
011students to see what else we may be offer able to offer for our students that provides rigor and academic interest for all of our high school students. So what are we seeing with our students right? We are seeing a changing demographic both good and bad but the challenge is the fact that we do have a greater percentage of students with IEPs. This does result in a greater number of students needing to be placed out of district which raises the cost for the district both in the program and the transportation required. Also to we do have a sharp increase in the number of mental health referrals our social workers and school counseling team is working heavily with county agencies to be able to support our kids. All right. So for 2026 2027 we're looking at a
012total budget expense 18 million 488,484 that is a 1 million 336,399 increase that is 7.79% what we'll talk about in a little bit is the tax levy in the capital project. That is a big portion of this increase due to the bonds and bans that we purchased and are now going to have to start paying obligation. So, for this year we're looking at uh increase to our non-instructional budget of 1,086,000. That is 11%. Again, that is more a majority due to the band debt that we just occurred of $9 million this year due to that capital project that was approved in 2023. And total instructional budget, we are only looking at a $250,000 increase. A lot of that is due the savings and that is due to um retired teachers retiring and attritioning those positions
013or bringing in teachers at step one or step two. Um so, there's a savings driven there. But, in total, we are looking at that $1.3 million increase in total over the budget. So, we have budget summaries provided at Germantown Library, Germantown Town Hall, and we do have them at our districts. I have a copy with me here today. Um but, if anybody needs them, they can um go to there and get that. We do have QR codes on all of our flyers and and brochures and that will get you right to the district's website with all the financial data as well. So, tax levy, one of the big pieces. So, next year we are looking at a 6.56% increase. Um that isn't that is still within the New York State tax levy, so that does
014not require a super majority vote. Um the total tax levy for the inclusion is 723,000. That is an increase from last year, which was 291,000. So, given our total tax levy of 11,706,545. Tax cap increase, so we increased the tax cap $718,000 from last year. And again, that is within that 2% threshold, so we do not need a super majority vote. So, looking at the tax calculator, so just walk through this with you real quick. So, we start on the calculator at the top on this left side of the page. We start with last year's tax levy, which is this year's current tax levy. The state applies a growth factor to that tax levy, which brings us to a new base of 11 million 59,000. Last year's exclusions were 291,727. We take that out cuz
015that's last year's difference between our principal and interest in state aid for building aid. Um that brings us to 10,767,000. We apply the 2%, which is the maximum threshold without needing a supermajority vote to that, which brings us to 10,900,000. So, that is our new base without exclusions. This year's exclusions, so our bond principal and interest minus our 26-27 building aid brings us to what we're estimating at 723,413. So, we add that to the 10,900,000 gives us to 11,000,000 706 thousand dollars. What does that look like for the taxpayers? So, we are looking at that and calculating that out um on here. So, we have last year's data. So, this is 2025 data looking at what our new tax rates would be. So, calculating that out into a home that's worth 350,000 dollars. Uh we
016are looking at a 196 dollar increase for Ancram, 184 dollar increase for Clermont, Gallatin is 285. We have Germantown is 300. Livingston at 376. And Taghkanic is 177,000. Um that is 70 177 dollars. I'm sorry. Um change percent, so we do have that down here of what the change per thousand dollars of your assessed full value is. Looking at the budget, we're always required to break it down into the three parts, administrative, capital, and program. So, our administrative budget is 8.10% of the budget, capital is 14.48, that is an increase from last year due to the bands, and then our program, of course, should always be the majority of the budget at 77.42%. Our annual vote for the school board is on May 19th in the elementary school gymnasium from 7:30 a.m. to 9:00 p.m.
017Please come out and vote. So, contingent budget always a conversation if the budget was to ever go down or voted down. A board has the ability to go to a contingent budget after a first vote budget is voted down, but you are allowed a second vote. Um if that second vote was to go down, you're forced into a contingent budget. What does that mean? So, uh the board chooses or decides to have that second vote or not. Then they're going to decide ordinary and contingent expenses. So, we're only allowed to keep ordinary contingent or permanent in this budget. The board is permitted to determine what consists of that ordinary contingent expense with some limitations. So, looking at that, first off, tax levy. Our tax levy under contingent budget cannot exceed last year's prior year's tax
018levy. I'm going to back up a little bit so we can see what that means. So, if we go back to the tax levy calculator, what they mean by that, first I want to point out exclusions. So, exclusions are excluded from the tax levy. So, what we do is we go back to last year's total. You take out last year's exclusions from the 10,000,988, you take out 291. Gives us what our new base would be, and then we add the exclusions. So, the exclusions don't go away, the debt and the principal that we have to pay on these bands are still going to be on the tax levy and they are going to be incurred in a contingent budget. Um the only thing that's affected is the additional funding that goes towards programming. Uh administrative
019cap limitations, so administrative caps cannot be greater than the prior years of the defeated budget. Non-contingent expenditures generally must be removed from a contingent budget. Some examples can be equipment purchases, new capital projects, or current capital project that's in phase three would continue cuz that's already approved. But we do have a capital outlay to replace asbestos floor tiles in three classrooms. Which with capital outlays we spend up to $100,000, we get exactly $100,000 back from the state. That wouldn't be able to happen. We'd have to take that off the table. Uh as long as those projects are not related to health and safety. So those classroom floors are not breaking and brittle, so they would not fall under health and safety. Uh use of school building and grounds by outside organizations cannot rent out unless
020we're covering the full cost of the building, uh electric, and staffing. Ordinary contingent expenses are expenditures necessary to provide the minimum services legally required. So to operate and maintain the school buildings and the educational programs, preserve the property of the district and ensure the health and safety of students and staff, are legal expenses, debt service, interest and principles on district borrowings, judgment court orders, orders on Commissioner of Education, legal obligations including social security, payroll taxes, and garnishments. Pre-act pre-existing contractual obligations. Those would all still exist. We have to continue to pay those. Other expenses permitted, uh teachers, administrators, superintendent, and other positions requiring SED certification, district clerk, district treasurer, internal claims auditors may receive salary increases under a contingent budget. Non-instructional salary increases including clerical, custodial, maintenance personnel, they are permitted as well under contingent
021budget to getting increases. Last but not least, our Board of Education this year, we have four candidates seeking to fill three open seats. Um we have Paula Wright, Andrea Foley, Cheryl Sinacore, and Britney Beer all running. Uh the two top candidates will fill two four will fill four-year terms that will expire June 30th, 2030. And the third runner-up will fill immediately a seat that is um due to a resignation that will start May 20th, 2026 and expire June 30th, 2027. That's all I have. Thank you very much. Any questions?