Schools Preview $198M Budget

New Haven schools want $9 million more to operate next year than they got this year. The district has few illusions that they will get that much from the city.

Instead, it’s looking to the state and federal governments. The district won’t know until later this spring how much more money might flow from those sources, according to New Haven Public Schools Chief Financial Officer Phillip Penn.

“Please don’t use the term deficit yet,” Penn said. ​“Until we know our revenue, we don’t know our deficit either.”

Penn revealed the projected budget for the 2021 – 2022 fiscal year on Monday to the Board of Education’s Finance and Operations Committee.

The board is scheduled to finalize its request to the Board of Alders by late February. The alders adopt a final city budget in May.

The total projected budget for the next fiscal year, which ends in the summer of 2022, is $198.14 million. This is around the same operating budget the board asked the alders for last year.

The Board of Education’s request was not successful last year. Facing its own gap between dollars coming in and dollars needed, the Board of Alders cut positions from departments and gave city schools a total of $189.2 million. 

The city’s financial situation is looking dire again this year, with a $66 million projected deficit that would be ​“nearly impossible to fix” without Yale or state intervention, according to Mayor Justin Elicker.

“Reading the news, there’s not a lot of optimism there” about city help, Penn said.

The primary drivers of the schools’ larger budget ask are teacher and administrator salaries.

Teachers swallowed a huge chunk of the school deficit this year by agreeing to a wage freeze. Still, the new contract allows them to move up the salary ladder next year and gives the top step of teachers a $2,500 raise.

Administrators and paraprofessionals would get raises across the board according to their contracts. The budget accounts for raises among other staff members as well.

The district’s plan to permanently close West Rock and Quinnipiac schools is also factored into the budget. The closure only saves the district $920,000, not including the renovation costs the district would have needed to spend to reopen them. This is because staff and instructional resources will follow the students as they move into other buildings, Penn explained.

Budgeting For Equity

Penn’s presentation had a new focus on how district money gets divided up between different schools. Finance and Operations Chairman Matt Wilcox has asked for this perspective so the committee can better follow the district’s newly explicit racial equity goals.

Penn showed how some schools, like Nathan Hale School, rely completely on local dollars as non-Title I, non-magnet schools. He proposed that the district add $100,000 to the combined budgets of schools like Nathan Hale and a total of $250,000 to schools like Fair Haven with high English learner populations.

He drew the proposal from the way Hartford public schools divide up their district’s dollars and encouraged feedback from the board.

“There is no magic around the numbers I picked,” Penn said. ​“It’s an acknowledgement that equitable is not equal.”

Wilcox said that he liked the proposal so far and is interested in adding other metrics beyond funding source and language background in the future.

Other new asks could include 11 full-time hires to support multilingual learners, funds for play-based learning for young students and professional development for teachers, paraprofessionals and central office staff. 

CARES Act, Round II

Superintendent Iline Tracey shared one fiscal bright spot during the meeting: New Haven is slated to get $37.7 million from the latest round of Covid-related, federal relief.

That’s a little over four times the amount the district got in the first round of the CARES Act’s Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund (ESSERF). This ​“ESSER II” chunk of change stems from the coronavirus relief bill passed in December.

It’s also less than the state offered the slightly smaller districts of Hartford, Waterbury and Bridgeport.

The money is supposed to go towards catching students up during the pandemic and not plugging other budget gaps.

The state is encouraging districts to spend the money on tutoring, longer school days and summer school, alongside mental health help for students and staff. New Haven has until Sept. 2023 to finish spending the grant.

“This is intended to be a long-term support for students,” Penn said. ​“What the state has indicated is we should think big — something inventive in terms of recapturing academic gains.”

The district is putting together a leadership team to decide how to spend the money and send in the application to the state. Community input is encouraged, said Assistant Superintendent Keisha Redd-Hannans.