Hempfield school district approves preliminary budget with no tax hike

Hempfield Area School District property owners will not see a tax hike this year after board officials unanimously passed a $97.67 million preliminary budget this week.

This is the second budget in a row that has not raised taxes, following five years of gradual increases, setting taxes at 83.46 mills.

In all, the district has $97.67 million in expenditures and $97.6 million in revenues, with 62% coming from local sources, 37% from the state and 1% from federal sources. About 78% of expenditures come from salaries, health care benefits, charter school tuition and debt service.

More than $69,550 will be pulled from the fund balance to make up for the deficit.

The district will save more than $700,000 through attrition, a support position vacancy, a request for leave and by replacing five retiring employees with others at “more entry level rates,” said district Business Manager Wayne Wismar. Last year, six positions were reduced to balance the budget.

But the coronavirus pandemic has made it difficult to predict things such as earned income and real estate property taxes, Wismar said. Board President Tony Bompiani noted that uncertainty over the number of students who move to charter cyber schools in the coming years also will impact expenditures and revenue.

“Covid-19 has created uncertainty that’s hard to project,” Wismar said during Monday’s meeting. “The impact of unemployment related to covid-19 will likely impact negatively local revenue and the closure of businesses will adversely affect state revenue. Those are something very, very unique. There’s no parallels that we can draw against. It’s a very difficult budget to project.”

Board member Diane Ciabattoni, who voted in favor of the budget, added, “I’m hoping some adjustments can be made before the final judgment.”

Budget discussions will continue next month, before a vote at the June 15 meeting.

“These are some trying times for all of us, so I think whole communities are going to have to step up,” Bompiani said. “We don’t even know if we’re going to be able to open in the fall. … These are uncertain times, so we’ve got a lot of discussion in the next month or so.”