School budget cites need for added $11.9M

By TARA MONASTESSE
Posted 4/23/20

Superintendent of Schools Philip Thornton on Tuesday night unveiled a $181.4 million budget for the upcoming fiscal year - representing an $11.9 million increase in spending - during a lives tream meeting with a viewership of about 50

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School budget cites need for added $11.9M

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Superintendent of Schools Philip Thornton on Tuesday night unveiled a $181.4 million budget for the upcoming fiscal year – representing an $11.9 million increase in spending – during a lives tream meeting with a viewership of about 50 people.

The budget reflects what the administration says the department needs, which now leaves the committee the challenge of determining what it can trim knowing that an increase of such historic proportion won’t meet the approval of the mayor or City Council. That process starts at another online meeting today and will conclude when the committee meets again Tuesday to vote on the budget it will forward to Mayor Joseph J. Solomon.

On Tuesday night, Anthony Ferrucci, the district’s executive director of finance and operations, conducted a page-by-page analysis of the 68-page document.

“Of all the challenges that we’ve faced, this particular budget year seems to be one of the most challenging that we’ve had since I’ve been here,” said Ferrucci, who will have worked on 10 budgets in total for Warwick Schools. In anticipation for the upcoming budget, a program audit that has taken place for over seven months now has concluded that it will be necessary for the district to seek out “contractual concessions from its collective bargaining units.”

Citing the expenses carried over into 2020-21 from last year’s efforts to balance the budget, as well as the interruptions posed by distance learning in wake of the pandemic, Ferrucci outlined the difficulties of compiling costs for the upcoming year. With a total of $800,000 lost in state revenue and increased expenses totaling $11.1 million, a total increase of $11.9 million is predicted for the budget.

“The district does not take this number lightly at all,” Ferrucci said. “We are all in agreement that this is an extremely high ask to the community … this particular level of request can not be sent to the city.”

Including this increase, the district budget currently projects a total cost of $181,438,668 for FY 2020-21.

“The maximum, under the best of times, we could really think about expecting to receive from the community would be approximately $5.1 million in local, additional support one year over the next.” In wake of the pandemic, Ferrucci also estimated roughly $3 million or $3.5 million in additional funding for schools.

Describing the process of identifying and making cuts as a “collective effort,” Ferrucci emphasized the need to consider not only the deferrals made from last year but also the long-term needs addressed by the budget increases. Cuts made to professional development, technology and instructional materials in the past have now been carried forward into the new fiscal year, contributing into the $11.9 budget increase that Ferrucci explains has been “compounding over the last couple of years.” A significant cost is also posed by students in Warwick who require their transportation and other tuition costs covered as they attend schools outside of the district, currently resting at a total of 48.

While the committee’s review of the budget starts tonight, Ferrucci noted that renovations to the secondary schools would potentially be the first item to go if the committee ultimately decides not to go through with them.

Darlene Netcoh, president of the Warwick Teachers Union, emphasized the need to prioritize aspects of the budget most pertinent to students during a call with the Beacon on Wednesday.

“They need to prioritize funding for student programs, curriculum, professional development, and materials,” she said, adding that technology had proven itself as a crucial asset in the wake of distance learning.

She touched on the need to safeguard student activities, specifically pointing out that she hoped extracurriculars and sports would be kept in the budget following issues with retaining them last year. Netcoh also echoed concerns presented in her public comment read at the beginning of Tuesday’s meeting, which stated that the 6 p.m. deadline to submit public comments by email on the day before a meeting did not allow time to view any documents relevant to the meeting. Catherine Bonang, secretary to the superintendent, announced a revised deadline of 12 p.m. the day of a scheduled meeting to submit statements at the address publiccomments@warwickschools.org.

Committee members Judith Cobden and David Testa both raised questions regarding how to move forward with school cleaning, hoping to address the spread of disease when the time comes for students to return to traditional school buildings. Kevin Oliver, facilities maintenance and operations manager, stated that the current goal included an increase in hand sanitizer being distributed to schools; when asked about increasing the amount of daily cleanings conducting in school building, Oliver noted that this may result in issues with staffing.

Douglas Alexander, director of technology, closed the meeting with an analysis of the budget requested by the technology department – a total of $2.17 million, up $1.2 million from the final 2019-20 budget. The most prominent contributor to the budget request increase – about $600,000 for Chromebooks and licensing – Alexander attributes to the need for Chromebook repairs and replacements in order to replace computers that have been in use for four or five years at this point in time.

Another cost is the need for new Datacenter HW/SW and cloud services – about $180,000 – which Alexander called the “beating heart of the [district’s] network].” He noted that the current service has become largely outdated, and at this point the item will not be as appropriate to cut from the budget as in previous years.

With almost 4,000 Chromebooks set to expire by September 2021, the hope is to replace them gradually rather than all at once.

“The world’s manufacturing capabilities have been disrupted, so it’s difficult to forecast just how much these would cost. But what’s easy to say is that they’re not going to cost less,” Alexander said.

The second day of the FY 2020-21 budget review for Warwick Schools is set for today at 6 p.m. The live stream can be viewed on the WPS Video Youtube channel at youtu.be/kPH4hGuGP_k. 

Comments

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  • Justanidiot

    virtual schooling is expensive. if we stopped teaching kids altogether, we wouldn't be able to afford anything

    Thursday, April 23, 2020 Report this

  • wwkvoter

    Have they seen the news? Anyone heard about the GLOBAL economic SHUTDOWN? The Great Depression started from MUCH less.

    The next about ten budget years should be interesting! We are ALL going to make sacrifices. The "stimulus" is just going to hold us for a while, then, it's going to get very very serious...

    Friday, April 24, 2020 Report this

  • Thecaptain

    Just dump more taxpayer monies into the black hole called the Warwick School System. Maybe Karen Bachus should have calculated the ramifications of the 13.46 million dollar raise that they gave in the last 3 years to the under performing entity known as the Warwick Teachers union.

    Obviously we taxpayers understand that there is not a single person within this broken system that has the ability to do math. If so, especially on the accounting side, maybe they would have noticed that the maintenance director was stealing to the tune of over $100,000 worth of merchandise and using the department as a laundering facility to enrich his home and his wife (a Warwick School Teacher still employed by the way, just sayin"). Maybe they would have understood that the raises that they gave out would negatively impact every other line item in the budget. But then again, its all about the kids, right? Now we have every building in the city shut down but not 1 worker has been laid off. Great business approach. Dummies running the city. No limit on incompetence in Warwick.

    There are literally hundreds of examples showing the incompetence of the management of both the school side and the city side. There is only 1 option - RECEIVERSHIP. Time to hit the reset button. Watch the teachers come this year again and demand more money. Its time to vote EVERYONE OUT. EVERYONE. Or just keep paying as the giant sucking sound becomes louder.

    Friday, April 24, 2020 Report this

  • Warwickbeautiful

    Isn't captain criminal the same loser that announced to the entire world 10 years ago that he was moving out of Rhode Island? Just more hot air from the city's number one windbag.

    At least captain criminal's girlfriend put her money where her mouth was and moved out of Warwick. Maybe she has room in her basement down in Charlestown to provide a place for him to take his tired and stale act.

    Friday, April 24, 2020 Report this

  • thepilgrim

    Anyone in favor of giving even a penny to the school budget is an idiot and ignorant that the US Constitution, the highest law of the land, doesn’t allow for any public ( communist) education.

    Friday, April 24, 2020 Report this

  • wwkvoter

    It looks like "educated voter" is anything but...

    Saturday, April 25, 2020 Report this

  • Happy

    Question here, Is there anyone in the room that is surprised by what Phil is asking for?

    This on going saga will never end!

    I can see it now, here goes the sports, they will use the students to get us all juiced up!

    Wednesday, April 29, 2020 Report this

  • wwkvoter

    The mayor just announced 50 city employee layoffs, after giving them the option to forego the 2.75% pay raises and they chose layoffs instead.

    Maybe now there's anough money for the schools increase they asked for?

    Wednesday, April 29, 2020 Report this

  • perky4175

    i cant believe they need that much money schools are closed look at the money there saving

    Thursday, April 30, 2020 Report this