Conneaut approves preliminary 2025-26 budget
Wednesday's special meeting, which was advertised in the April 21 edition of The Meadville Tribune, was held immediately after the board's regular monthly work session and was necessary, board President Dot Luckock said, because state law requires that the preliminary budget be finalized at least 30 days before approval of the final budget. The board typically approves the preliminary budget at its regular May voting meeting, but this year that meeting takes place on May 14, just 28 days before the June 11 voting meeting when the final budget is expected to be approved.
'If we used next week's voting meeting, we're not going to be able to comply with the 30 days,' Luckock said, 'so therefore we added a special voting meeting this evening so that we can get that adopted.'
Board member John Burnham cast the only vote against the preliminary budget. Vice President GW Hall did not attend the meeting.
After the meeting, Burnham described his opposition as a symbolic move, one he has similarly made multiple times in the past, meant to express dissatisfaction on the part of taxpayers with regard to district borrowing to fund school building improvements prior to consolidation of the high schools more than a decade ago.
'I vote against the budget every year,' he said. 'It doesn't change anything, but the fact that we have put the taxpayers in debt for so many decades before those bonds are paid. For me, it's a — I'm just doing a protest vote.'
The preliminary budget comes with a deficit of $243,511.
'We are very close to balanced,' Business Manager Christine Krankota told the board. 'We still have a little bit of work to do.'
If this budget is approved, additional state funding would bring the current deficit down to just under $160,000, she added.
The preliminary budget keeps the district's property tax millage rate at 53.55 mills. Similarly, the earned income rate and Act 511 real estate transfer tax would both stay at 0.5 percent, and per capita taxes of $10 for all residents 18 and older would remain the same as well.
Total projected expenditures for next year are down nearly $145,000 from the current budget, while projected revenues are up slightly, from $43.3 million to $43.6 million.
Expenses that are increasing significantly include salaries, with 2 percent increases for teachers, 2.8 percent for support personnel and raises ranging from 2 to 3 percent for administrators and other staff members. The preliminary budget also included an increase of 5.5 percent for health care expenses. Debt service payments, cyber charter tuition and the district's share of the Crawford tech budget are also expected to go up.
The district's fund balance is projected to be $10.4 million at the end of June.
While the board won't be voting on the preliminary budget when it meets Wednesday at 6:30 p.m. in the Alice Schafer Annex gym, Krankota said she plans to present a slideshow update on the most recent changes to her projections for 2025-26.
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