Thursday, April 16, 2015
By Ed Runyan
LIBERTY
With the school district no longer in fiscal emergency, having shed that state designation in December, this would not be a good time for voters to reject the 7.75-mill, five-year Liberty renewal levy on the ballot May 5, Superintendent Stan Watson said.
“It’s crucial to pass [the levy] to continue on a pattern out of fiscal emergency and into fiscal stability,” he said.
Watson said one of the biggest accomplishments of the school district in getting out of fiscal emergency was doing it without passing an additional levy, which he said is rare.
“We did it with cuts and better operational efficiency,” he said, adding that getting there was a “painful process. We knew we had to do it to survive.”
The renewal levy raises $1,176,316 annually, so losing that much more would be a huge hit for the district, Watson said. It costs the owner of a $100,000 home $271.25 per year.
The district was in fiscal emergency for 31/2 years, but its five-year-forecast calls for it to have no deficit.
It accomplished that by reducing the number of full-time employees and turning some full-time positions into part-time.
“Twenty-two people lost their jobs flat out,” board member Diana DeVito said in December. “Fourteen went from full- to part-time because we had $4 million we had to cut.”
Lori Simeone, for example, the district’s treasurer, is part-time with Liberty through a contract with the Trumbull County Educational Service Center.
Likewise, the district has a part-time cafeteria supervisor; the position used to be full-time.
The district also switched from self-health insurance to the Ohio School Benefit Consortium.
The district is not part of the consortium run by the county’s Educational Service Center because there is an up-front cost that the district could not afford, Watson noted.
As for academics, “We’re doing an excellent job,” Watson said. “We’re working on literacy in the early grades. Many kids come to us behind, and it’s been a major focus to get them on track. Certainly there’s a lot of work to do.”