Niles BOE focuses on deficit fears

October 19, 2012 at 12:00a.m.

NILES

A forecast of seven-figure deficits and concerns about the search for a new superintendent confronted the board of education during Thursday’s meeting.

The five-year financial forecast for the school district projects a deficit of $2.9 million by the end of the 2016-17 school year — an amount that would place the district in fiscal emergency if revenue remains unchanged.

Linda Molinaro, district treasurer, said that her figures anticipate a deficit of $83,000 by the end of the current school year, a figure that the Ohio Department of Education considers “manageable.” However, the numbers escalate rapidly in the following school years with deficits expected to climb to $1.4 million by the 2016 school year and more than double in 2017.

Molinaro said it is too early to talk about the need for additional revenue because of the uncertainty of state funding. “We have to wait and see what the governor does,” Molinaro said.

The bleak figures were released in the first meeting attended by interim Superintendent Frank Danso, hired by the board last week for the remainder of the school year after the sudden resignation of Mark Robinson, who had been on the job only 14 months.

However, it was not Danso who was the subject of public comments during the meeting, but the search for his successor in the wake of the controversy over Robinson’s salary, residence and the resignation. Robinson’s salary exceeded $120,000 and he maintained his residence in Broadview Heights while living in an apartment in Niles during his short tenure.

Mary Ann McMahon, president of the Niles Education Association, the teacher bargaining unit, called on the board to consider a candidate who has “a vested interest in our community” and “a commitment of time to be willing to work in the district to see these projects through.”

McMahon also called for “up front” information about salary and benefit packages, a point echoed by another speaker, Jason Busse, a Niles resident who was critical of the bonus provisions in Robinson’s contract.

“I never got a bonus for doing the things I was brought in to do,” said Busse to loud applause from the audience.