Weathersfield school board OKs forecast

May 25, 2011 at 12:00a.m.

MINERAL RIDGE

The Weathersfield Board of Education has approved a five-year forecast with the district realizing a savings of $150,000 this year.

Expenditures have been decreased for the 2011 fiscal year, largely due to the district’s changing from hiring out services to doing them with district teachers in-house, and because teachers retired.

Revenues are up slightly at a projected $8.5 million this year.

“The trend is the same,” treasurer Laurena Rouan said, explaining expenditures still are expected to exceed revenues.

The year-end projection for 2011 (fiscal year running from July 1, 2010, to June 30, 2011) is for about a $1.8 million cash balance.

Though the district had help in the past two years with the Federal Education Jobs Bill and American Rehabilitation and Recovery Act funds totaling $364,000, the forecast for 2015 is still bleak. With a projected deficit of $1.221 million, Rouan said: “We’re going to do things we need to do so that doesn’t happen. This year — I feel pretty good about,” she said.

But, she added next year, with Senate Bill 5, there’s no word yet of additional federal money, and with other possibilities, a lot can change the picture.

She noted there may be teachers retiring. The district has opted to use its Ed-Jobs funds, which total $166,000, in 2012 to offset salaries.

Of the ARRA money, $198,000 was used for salaries, for in-school and after-school intervention programs for grades three through eight to give additional help to prepare students for the Ohio Achievement Test, Superintendent Damon Dohar said.

Middle school and Seaborn elementary school students also were introduced to an educational Internet program called “Study Island.” The Web-based program for grades three to eight gives each child a user name and password, and it can be used at school or at home. The use by students can be tracked on computer by the teachers, and Dohar said the response has been good.

The program also is geared toward preparing students for the state tests.

The district purchased 21 iPads through the Title I reading portion of ARRA funds for all grades in the elementary school to use.

Computers in the district were updated, and hardware and software were purchased.

In other business, the board hired Louis Cappitti for the position of maintenance/transportation supervisor, merging the jobs of two other people into one.

Cappitti, who has been with the Youngstown city schools for more than 30 years in maintenance, was given a three-year contract, from Aug. 1 through July 31, 2012, at a salary of $38,000; 2012-13 at $38,760; and 2013-14 at $39,535.

He will replace Dan Kiger, who resigned to take another job, and whose salary was $46,000; and Ron Knight, transportation supervisor, who will retire effective December 2011 at a salary of $21,000.