Shawano school officials Monday refused to approve a tax levy until options are considered that would shred at least $450,000 from the budget for the school year already under way.
The School Board voted 4-3 against ratifying the $12.9 million levy adopted by district voters at the annual meeting after learning the levy would translate into a higher than projected tax rate of $10.31 per $1,000 of equalized valuation.
The school district was projecting the tax rate would be unchanged from last year’s $9.95 per $1,000, but the projection wrongly assumed the district’s equalized valuation would finally tick back up this year after several years of decline.
Instead, district property values dropped by 2 percent.
Business Manager Gail Moesch repeatedly tried to explain to the board that the district was not requesting any more money than had been approved at the annual meeting.
“The dollar amount is the same,” she said.
Moesch said the budget would have to be cut by anywhere from $450,000 to $475,0000 to keep last year’s tax rate.
Board members spent more than an hour Monday combing through the budget trying to find potential cuts, even zeroing in at one point on whether the district was budgeting too much for postage.
The board will meet again at 5:30 p.m. Thursday. By state law, a levy must be adopted and delivered to municipalities no later than Nov. 6.
Board president Julie Van Dyck and members Derek Johnson, Jay Jones and Bruce Milavitz voted against approving the levy.
Diane Hoffman, Tyler Schmidt and Al Heins voted in favor. Marcia Yeager was absent.
“I would like to look line by line at the different items on the budget side and see where there could possibly be reductions,” Milavitz said.
Moesch said she would bring some options to the meeting Thursday, but said she needed direction from the board.
“What programs are you willing to give up?” she said. “What are you going to stand up to the community and say, ‘We had to cut this program because we wanted to keep the (tax) rate at a certain amount?’ Those are the kinds of hard decisions you as board members now have to make.”
A majority of the 100-plus residents attending the annual meeting on Aug. 19 supported the proposed 2013-14 tax levy of $12,928,232, a 1.5 percent increase from the 2012-13 school year. However, some residents questioned why they were approving the levy in August instead of waiting until October when final numbers on enrollment and equalized valuation are available.
District officials said delaying the annual meeting until October would give them little time to make budget changes — the very changes they now apparently must make.
Despite the budget uncertainties in August, district officials promised residents that the tax rate would remain at $9.95 per $1,000 of equalized valuation.
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