Raises for teachers were the highlight of the $136 million budget members of the Worcester County Board of Education approved last week.
A group of Snow Hill High School teachers gather in the hallway on the first day of the 2023-24 school year.
Photo courtesy Worcester County Public Schools
County gets final say on FY25 funding plan
By Charlene Sharpe, Associate Editor
Raises for teachers were the highlight of the $136 million budget members of the Worcester County Board of Education approved last week.
The school board voted 5-1 last week to approve a proposed Fiscal Year 2025 budget that includes a step increase and a 6% cost-of-living adjustment for teachers. The budget includes a 6.5% cost-of-living raise for support staff as well as a pay increase for bus drivers.
“Our parents come to the board and share requests for what they think is important for the board’s budget,” Chief Financial Officer Vince Tolbert said. “This past year it was stated over and over again by every parent that came to the table where their priorities were. They were to recruit, hire, retain high quality teachers and staff, to maintain small class sizes and to restore FY24 cuts… Our budget addresses those three priorities shared with the board by our parents and our community.”
Tolbert told the school board the proposed budget was $136 million, with about 80%, or $109,632,071, in county appropriations. He said about $26 million was expected in state aid.
The fiscal 2025 budget includes a step increase and 6% COLA for certificated staff and a 6.5% COLA for support staff. The 6% COLA has been discussed by the school system in recent weeks as the best way for Worcester County Public Schools to work toward the $60,000 starting teacher salary that will be mandated by the state in fiscal 2027.
Salary increases are expected to cost $5.9 million in the coming year. Health insurance increases are expected to exceed $1.8 million. Tolbert noted that health insurance rates wouldn’t be finalized until March.
School board member Katie Addis asked about the possibility of zero-based budgeting, something she thought might help the school system reevaluate what was important.
Tolbert said that more than 86% of the school system’s budget was spent on staff. He added that the school system also had to increase salaries to meet the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future mandate to get starting teacher pay from around $50,000, where it is now, to $60,000.
“I hear what you’re saying Katie, I do, but to get where we need to be without additional funding we’re going to have to reduce positions,” Tolbert said. “That’s just God’s honest truth.”
Addis also asked about other post-employment benefits, or OPEB. Tolbert said the school system’s OPEB account was about 20% funded. He said there was not a certain funding level requirement. School board member Jon Andes said OPEB changes implemented by the Governmental Accounting Standards Board in 2005 required municipal governments set aside money for OPEB.
“So the taxpayers of Worcester County are putting money in a fund that only benefits the fund manager…,” Andes said. “Worcester County cannot touch that money unless there is a catastrophe. I don’t think Worcester County will ever go bankrupt or financially insolvent.”
He said there was no certain level that OPEB needed to be funded.
“What do we get from it? We get nothing from it,” he said. “The only time it will ever be legally tapped into is if Worcester County becomes insolvent which I don’t see happening.”
Tolbert said Andes was correct but added that the funding could be used to pay for current retiree benefits.
Addis asked if there had been discussion during the budget process about ways to save money.
“Sure we always look at how we can save money,” Tolbert said. “One of the things we looked at was scaling back our summer programs.”
Annette Wallace, chief safety and academic officer for grades 9-12, said there was no place to make cuts significant enough to make an impact. She said the school system had been criticized for what it spent on car washes. She said that was about $3,000 a year.
“It’s just not going to make a significant impact,” she said. “Let alone the discussion we’re below the threshold of other county organizations in expenses like that.”
She said there had been discussions about cutting staff but that the superintendent had opted not to because parents and community members valued small class sizes.
School board member Bill Buchanan said school officials knew what they needed for their facilities to run effectively.
“We have to trust the administrative and the financial departments to make the decisions,” he said. “We can’t go line by line like some county governments do. I don’t feel like I have the expertise to do that.”
Addis said she felt the school system leadership was capable but still believed the board should do more.
“I am saying that we as the elected board are the checks and balances and yes we should be going and having a more comprehensive budget and not striking things, but having a conversation about it…,” she said. “While we can trust the executive team, it is not our job to trust. Otherwise there’s no reason for us to be here other than to rubberstamp a budget because we trusted them.”
Wallace said the board had held multiple budget work sessions.
Addis said the board didn’t have a comprehensive budget at that point. The board went on to vote 5-1, with Addis opposed, to approve the budget. The proposed budget is scheduled to be discussed with county officials in April.
Weston Young, the county’s chief administrative officer, said in an interview this week that county staff would be reviewing the school system’s proposed spending plan prior to that meeting. He said he had met with the school system’s executive team regarding their budget format about a month ago. Young said that while there were improvements in how they displayed certain operating expenses from last year, details about revenues, positions, fixed charges, and restricted grant expenditures were missing or needed more clarification.
“We understand they have the difficult challenge of reallocating existing resources to implement the Blueprint’s requirements, however we’re optimistic we will receive a comprehensive budget this year,” he said.
Young also addressed the relevance of OPEB and why the school system’s OPEB funding liability mattered.
“The funding of the OPEB trust for board of education employees not only guarantees their benefits in retirement, but it also impacts our credit rating and the interest rate we pay when we borrow for projects like school construction,” he said. “The board’s budget has not fully covered the cost of current retirees, let alone additional funding to grow an investment trust. The county has picked up the slack and will continue to do so to honor the entitled benefits of retirees. Until this trust is fully funded it will negatively impact our credit rating. When fully funded it will pay for the annual contribution for retirees.”