By Chris Paul
During a rather short discussion held at the Tuesday, Nov. 23, Londonderry School Board meeting, the District’s Business Administrator, Peter Curro made members aware of a glitch that came about while trying to figure out the school’s tax rate.
Curro said that he, and others had read the wrong column on a spreadsheet provided by the state when trying to determine the state property tax rate revenue and the associated tax rate.
He told the board that he had corrected the numbers in the spreadsheet he provided members in the budget binder they were given.
Superintendent Scott Laliberte followed that introduction by saying he would be giving a walk through on the upcoming budget and giving members of the board the opportunity to get acquainted with what goes into building the budget.
The school board will be holding a number of workshops leading to public hearings and the School Deliberative.
Laliberte started by saying, “Tonight, I’m advancing to the school board a budget that seeks to maintain our existing programs and build on our successes and allow us to adapt to the learning challenges that were brought on by the COVID pandemic.”
He added that the goal of the district is to present a budget that is as fiscally responsible as possible and also lives up to the high expectations that the community has for them.
Laliberte said the 2023 proposed general fund budget has been set at $83,107,237, which represents an increase of &1,609,781, or a 1.9 percent increase over the current budget.
The Default Budget is set at $82,855,538, which is a 1.67 percent increase over the current budget.
In the upcoming budget discussions Laliberte said they will be focusing on making sure graduates are prepared for advancement after graduation.
He added that there will be a lot attention being paid toward recovering learning losses caused by the pandemic over the past two years.
They will also be focusing on getting back to efforts lost during the pandemic since they’ve had to stray from some of the priorities that were set years ago because things associated with the pandemic.
He finished by saying that he looks forward to diving into this year’s budget workshops and knows that there is a lot of work to be done.
Those wishing to review the FY 2023 budget can find a copy on the School District’s webpage, londonderry.org, at the Business Office page.