School board approves revised budget
Council chops spending plan down $15 less than original budget proposal
BY KATHY CHANG Staff Writer
After working with the Woodbridge Township Council on the defeated school budget, the Board of Education unanimously voted last week in favor of the revised budget, which will increase taxes by $97.50 per year for the owner of an average home.

The tax increase is $15 less than the proposed increase of $112.50 that was defeated by the public on April 15.

"The whole process was amicable," Schools Superintendent Vincent Smith said after the board meeting on May 15.

The superintendent said that he and Business Administrator Dennis DeMarino, the board, the town council, an auditor hired by the township, and other central staff members had numerous phone conversations justifying budget lines.

"We were in agreement and felt that these [cuts] do not hurt the school district [for the 2008-09 school year]," said Smith.

A total of $650,000 was cut from the defeated $183 million budget, making the revised budget total $182,947,229.

The cuts include $235,000 of the $239,026 state facilities tuition that the school district received subsequent to the preparation of the budget; $38,000 from the $698,045 in Public Employees' Retirement System (PERS) pension costs (the projected percentage increase has been reduced from 8.44 percent to 8.28 percent); and $377,000 from the $2,217,760 in health care benefits costs.

The revised school tax would rise 13 cents rather than 15 cents, from $4.34 to $4.47, for each $100 of assessed valued. The average home is assessed at $75,000.

The cuts do not affect the curriculum and sports programs that the school district proposed.

The school district had allotted $35,000 in the budget for a middle school sports program, and the budget included several new curriculum initiatives, including a Chinese program for grades seven and eight at Colonia, Iselin, and Woodbridge middle schools and for grades nine and 10 at Colonia, John F. Kennedy Memorial, and Woodbridge high schools, and the implementation of off-duty police officers in the five middle schools.