Letter to the editor: Good financial stewards in Norwin

Thank you, Norwin School Board. We do have those who are good fiscal stewards of our money at Norwin, but it is not the district administration. Through job reduction via attrition and something called “unassigned fund balance,” the budget was balanced with no tax increase.

At a recent meeting, school board member Bob Wayman pointed out that the district is hoarding money above Pennsylvania’s allowable limit. Reducing this surplus would free up funds.

This actually was beneficial for a possible opportunity to hire a music teacher or a social studies teacher. Dipping into this unassigned fund balance would have had zero effect on the proposed no tax budget, but there was opposition to that because on one side if they couldn’t save six positions, they opposed saving one; and on the other side they could not grasp the idea of hiring a teacher position without a tax increase.

There was also a parent that spoke against hiring the social studies teacher. Therefore we got no one.So we lost an opportunity to hire another teacher at no additional tax to the public.

For the long term, our tax base should grow even more now that it was demonstrated that there are places that can hold the line on the budget during difficult times.

Rich Walczak

North Huntingdon

The writer is District 3 committeeman for the Westmoreland County Republican Committee.