NORTHFIELD — Trying to make an understandable financial plan for the coming school year during an unusually complicated financial situation, the Pioneer Valley Regional School Committee and district administrators have developed eight hypothetical budget scenarios for the School Committee and town officials to compare.
At one extreme of the eight scenarios is the “zero increase” requested by the four towns’ finance committees, which would result in a deficit of about $375,000. At the other end is a 4.8 percent increase that would allow the district to make essentially no major cuts in services and still break even.
Not all of the scenarios are real possibilities, Pioneer Superintendent Jon Scagel said. The intention is to give the School Committee tangible options, which will be further refined.
Between the two extremes are scenarios that meet somewhere in the middle. These include major cost-saving measures, most notably the heavily debated closures of Leyden’s Pearl Rhodes Elementary School and Warwick Community School. There is also a new possibility of moving the sixth grade classes from the elementary schools to the middle-high school, which has not yet been discussed in detail.
In the only scenario in which the towns pay less than this year, the district would close both elementary schools and move all four towns’ sixth-graders to the middle-high school. The towns’ payments would be 0.25 percent lower than they were this year.
For a 2 percent increase over this year’s payments, Warwick Community School would stay open, but Pearl Rhodes would close and the sixth-graders would be moved. For a 3.5 percent increase, both elementary schools could stay open, but the sixth-graders would still have to move. There is no scenario in which Warwick Community School is closed and Pearl Rhodes stays open.
Because of a convoluted legal situation, the School Committee will likely have to approve a budget with no school closures by the end of February, and then revise the budget after voting on the school closures in March.
The Pioneer district is currently under special legislation allowing the School Committee to close elementary schools to make the district financially sustainable, but that special authority doesn’t go into effect until the district has borrowed money to cover its $450,000 deficit. Pioneer Finance Director Tanya Gaylord expects the borrowing to be finalized at some point in March.
But because of the towns’ deadlines in planning for their spring town meetings, the school district needs a workable budget ready by the first week of March. Because the district’s borrowing is unlikely to be ready by then, the budget approved by the School Committee at its Feb. 28 meeting cannot include school closures.
Whenever the district’s borrowing is finalized, the School Committee will vote on school closures and adopt a budget reflecting the change.
Contact Max Marcus at mmarcus@recorder.com or 413-772-0261 ex 261.