Waterford BOE Approves $44.62M Budget for 2013-14 School Year

Thursday night, Waterford Superintendent Jerome Belair had a surprise for the Board of Education: another $242,792 in savings from his original proposal for the 2013-14 school year, bringing the sum to $44.62 million, or a 0.96 percent increase from this year’s $44.2 million total.

The savings were mostly from $228,269 in reduced health care costs after the district renegotiated the health care bid with its carrier, Anthem, Belair said. Belair said tuition costs, which Waterford has no control over, are increasing by $430,161 next year, meaning that the district's operating budget is lower than this year's.

“If we did not have that increase, we would be below zero,” Belair said.

The Board of Education voted to unanimously approve the budget and to forward it to the Board of Finance. The group complimented Belair, the administration and the entire staff for proposing a budget with a 0.96 percent increase.

“This is the lowest proposed increase I can remember since I’ve been around (Waterford),” Board of Education Chairwoman Kathleen McCarty said. “This is good news for the Board of Education tonight and I think the community should be very pleased.”

Board member Jody Nazarchyk agreed.

“I just wanted to thank you,” she said to Belair. “I think you did a wonderful job with the budget.”

Budget

The proposed budget for the 2013-14 school year adds a security guard to Waterford High School and another guidance counselor to Clark Lane Middle School. It also takes two positions from the high school and adds them to the town’s three elementary schools to ensure all elementary class sizes are at 22 students or below.

The largest increase in the budget is a $430,161 – or 27.35 percent - bump in tuition costs. Tuition is the amount Waterford pays to other schools students choose to go to, such as a magnet school or a vocational school, or for special needs children who go to specialized schools.

The largest decrease in the proposed budget is health insurance, which dropped $590,000 from this year’s total. That is a stark change from previous years, where health insurance represented the largest increases in the budgets.

The reason health insurance declined is because the administration has renegotiated contracts with employees to include , which saves money for both the district and often the employee. The administration also has had more discussions with employees about health care, which has ensured that spouses don’t both have individual plans and employees are more cost-conscious on choosing where to go for medical care.