Petr Sejba/moneytoplist.com
By NANETTE LoBIONDO GALLOWAY
VENTNOR – The Board of Education has recommended the district not replace several teachers and a secretary who are retiring at the end of the school year, along with other staffing changes that could help the district hold the line on tax increases.
The board has been holding school budget discussions at its monthly meetings. The meeting on Feb. 27 brought about a somewhat lively discussion about the board’s recommendation to reduce staffing.
The board also recommended eliminating one of the district’s five administrative positions, and hire from within to fill a new teaching position being created in the Early Childhood Education program, board President James Pacanowski said.
“After looking at a lot of things, including our enrollment and programs, the board recommended budget cuts that include not replacing staff, eliminating an administrator and hiring from within,” Pacanowski said Monday afternoon.
The staffing changes could save the district more than $500,000 and eliminate a potential tax rate increase.
The board recommended the district reduce its administrative team by one position. The district currently has five administrators, including a superintendent, two principals, a supervisor of special education and a curriculum coordinator.
“We did some research with the NJ Department of Education to see what other school districts in our area have and the department said that for the enrollment we have now, we could do with just four administrators,” Pacanowski said.
Which positions should be eliminated or combined is a decision that must be made by Superintendent Eileen Johnson, Pacanowski said.
“We can only make the recommendation. It’s up to the superintendent to implement it,” he said.
A telephone call to Johnson’s office requesting comment was not returned in time for this publication Monday afternoon.
Although the district is planning to expand its grant-funded pre-kindergarten program by one section for the 2019-2020 school year, the board has asked the administration to fill that position in-house. The pre-kindergarten program is fully funded by the state, he said.
The board also recommended that the district reduce the secretarial pool by one position. The board wants administration to refrain from replacing the Child Study Team secretary, who is also retiring at the end of the school year. Instead, three secretary positions – CST secretary, elementary and middle school secretary positions – should be combined to form two positions, he said.
Pacanowski said the district would not seek a shared superintendent with Margate at this time.
“Margate has made it clear they are not interested in sharing a superintendent,” Pacanowski said.
“Our superintendent’s contract is not up until next year, and Margate won’t do anything until their interim superintendent’s contract is up, and that’s two years,” he said. “Perhaps we can bring it up again next year when we are both in different positions.”
Pacanowski said the Board of Commissioners wants the school district to come in with a tax rate decrease, but how much must be cut from the tax levy is unknown at this time, he said.
“We won’t know until the state releases state aid figures on March 7,” he said.
Gov. Phil Murphy is scheduled to make his annual budget address on Tuesday afternoon.
Mayor Beth Holtzman said she has not given the district a dollar amount to cut, nor has she indicated a projected tax levy decrease.
“We did not give them a number. We simply asked them to give the Board of School Estimates a realistic budget that reflects the needs of the enrollment,” she said.
Holtzman said enrollment has declined substantially over the last 10 years.
“For the budget to come in with a zero increase like it has in the past few years is not acceptable, because it is not justified,” Holtzman said.
Ventnor City Education Association President Gina Perkins said the union wants the board to know the difficulties that will occur if their recommendations are implemented.
“We still have students who need basic skills instruction in the classroom,” she said, so class sizes, which should be around 20 students, should not be increased.
As of Feb. 19, the district had 676 students, down from 752 in 2015, including 73 pre-kindergarteners and 60 kindergarteners. There are between 14-22 students in Elementary School classrooms, and 17-30 students in Middle School homerooms.
“We are the ones working in the classroom every day and we know how the students could be affected,” she said. “The board needs to know what’s going on in the classroom on a daily basis.”
Perkins said the district has fewer teachers than it did six years ago.
“We have had 15 teachers retire over the last six years who were not replaced. We’re at the point now where we can’t take another non-replacement. We want the teachers replaced to maintain our programs and class sizes,” she said.
Perkins said the VCEA is willing to continue the conversation on preserving teaching positions at future meetings.
The Ventnor Education Foundation is asking parents to get in on the conversation by attending budget meetings over the next several weeks to “maintain the high level of education” in Ventnor.
“The proposed recommendations could negatively impact our students and programs,” someone posted on the VEF’s Facebook page. “Ventnor has been a high-achieving school district and needs to stay that way.”
The board will hold a special meeting 3:30 p.m. Monday, March 11 to approve the submission of the school budget for the review and approval of the Atlantic County Executive Superintendent of Schools.
The next regular school board meeting is scheduled for 6 p.m. Wednesday, March 27.
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