Board awaits council’s
decision on budget cuts
By kathy baratta
Staff Writer

HOWELL — With a vote of 1,462 to 1,138, residents defeated the Board of Education’s proposed $82 million budget for the 2002-03 school year in the April 16 election.

It is now the responsibility of the Township Council to review the budget for the K-8 district and determine if reductions in the spending plan should be recommended. The council can recommend reductions in the budget, which the school board may accept or appeal, or the governing body may leave the budget as the board proposed it, in effect negating the voters’ wishes to defeat the plan.

The defeated budget carried a $47.5 million tax levy and would have increased the local school tax rate from $1.572 to $1.676 per $100 of assessed valuation.

The first budget proposed by the board called for a 12.8-cent increase in the tax rate. After $1 million was chopped from the tax levy the budget voted on by residents proposed a 10.4-cent increase in the tax rate.

Superintendent of Schools Dr. Enid Golden said that a voter turnout of less than 9 percent of Howell’s registered voters defeated a budget that was "no frills." Golden said she thought the drop in the tax increase from 12.8 to 10.4 cents would have given the budget a better chance of passing.

"It was a bare bones budget that had already been significantly reduced," Golden said, adding that the only addition to the budget was a state-mandated world language program.

Also contained in the budget was a 3.5-percent increase in employee benefits over last year’s costs. Assistant Superintendent Herb Massa previously attributed the rise in the amount for employee benefits to the rising cost of health insurance.

School board member Robert Antonnacio, chairman of the board’s finance committee, previously referred to the proposed budget as "no frills" and called the spending plan for the coming year "a maintenance budget."

Golden said the council will now have to review the defeated budget.

"They will review it and give us a dollar amount and tell us where to cut," the superintendent said.

Also in the April 16 election, voters re-elected three incumbents to the school board for three-year terms. Marcie Nowicki, Gene Tanala and Louis Corato ran unopposed for the volunteer positions. Nowicki received 1,656 votes, Tanala tallied 1,687 votes and Corato polled 1,667 votes.