Breaking Down Hauppauge's $97.2M School Budget

On May 17, residents within the The Hauppauge Public School District,will vote on an adopted for the 2011-2012 school year that increases spending by $3.2 million and includes a slate of cuts.

When you break the budget down by the numbers, Hauppauge schools took at $1.4 million cut in educational aid, despite an overall increase of 4.64 percent in state funding.

Assistant Superintendent James Stucchio said the increase is due to New York giving the district an extra $1.3 million to put towards a $1.7 million bond payment on the $28 million bond the district took to pay for .

While receiving less educational aid, Hauppauge school district must absorb $4,613,000 in mandated increases to the New York State health insurance and retirement programs. This creates a $3.2 million gap for the district to close through cutbacks and boosting the tax levy.

The proposed budget slashes 32 staff positions, including 23 teaching positions and five teaching assistants, sports coaches and teams and more than $41,000 in co-curricular activities.

This will result in 16 teachers and three teaching assistants being laid off after attrition due to enrollment and retirements.

Administration

Hauppauge's will drop two full-time staff positions and will not re-hire the project administrator with the reconstruction projects nearing completion, saving the district more than $300,000 next year.

Superintendent Patricia Sullivan-Kriss and the assistant superintendents said they will not take more compensation in the 2010-2011 school year, reducing staff costs by $23,177.

Overall, these administrative cuts will save the district more than $350,000.

The high school will lose five full-time teaching positions. These are split between the core academic subjects with 0.8 in English, 0.2 in social studies, 0.6 in math, 1 in science and 1.4 in health and 0.8 in FACS. Each class that a teacher instructs students is counted as 0.2. There will also be one special education teaching position eliminated.

Due to the health teaching position being cut, students will only be required to take one semester of health instead of two.

In addition, one librarian will be dropped, forcing the high school and middle school libraries to share staff in the fall.

The proposed budget cuts 5.8 teaching positions at the middle school. This is divided by: 1.2 in English, 0.8 in social studies, 1.4 in math, 1.1 in science, 0.6 in foreign languages, 0.2 in FACS and 0.5 in art. Like the high school, Hauppauge Middle School will lose one special education teaching position.

Middle school students will also lose one guidance counselor in the 2011-2012 school year.

Elementary Schools

Teaching cuts will also affect elementary school students, with staff being reassigned if necessary. Two full-time teaching positions will be eliminated based on enrollment with another 2.8 positions being reduced in special education by combining classes. There will be one math support instructional position cut and 0.4 reading supports cut.

Non-Teaching Personnel

The district will be reducing its security force at the Hauppauge High School by $31,276. It will also eliminate a vacant bus driver and monitor positions.

Sports Teams

Hauppauge school district plans to cut the junior varsity tennis teams. In addition, eight varsity-level assistant coaching positions will be reduced from the boys and girls basketball, boys and girls soccer, baseball, softball and varsity football teams. This will cut the district's sports coaching budget by $74,580 from the current year.

Based on recommendations from Section 11, school officials plan to combine the seventh- and eighth-grade sports teams at the middle school, saving the district $23,675.

Co-Curricular Activities

School officials have eliminated $41,700 from the budget for Hauppauge student’s co-curricular activities:

*$25,280 at Hauppauge High School
*$16,955 at Hauppauge Middle School
*$1,739 at
*$4,320 at
*$1,387 at

Reserves & Tax Levy

The board of education has authorized school officials to use $700,000 from the district’s reserves to offset the 2011-2012 tax levy increases.

If the adopted budget is passed, Town of Islip homeowners can expect to pay an average of $5,585 in taxes for the 2011-2012 school year, an increase of $184 annually or 3.4 percent over the current year based on the 2010 assessment rates.

Town of Smithtown homeowners can expect pay $5,021 in the 2011-2012 school year if the budget is approved, an increase of 3.46 percent, or an additional $168 annually over the current year based on the town’s current assessment rates.