Schools

Point Pleasant Beach Board of Education Unanimously Passes Budget with Average $59 Tax Hike

Only a few questions about budget at sparsely- attended meeting

A proposed Point Pleasant Beach school district budget that would raise taxes on the average assessed home by $59 per year was adopted unanimously at a special Board of Education meeting Tuesday night.

Owners of homes assessed at $691,281,the average assessment in Point Pleasant Beach, would pay an additional $59 in school taxes, or $3,144 annually, if  the $10.6 million tax levy is approved by voters on April 27, according to the district website.

The proposed budget calls for the current school tax rate of 44.64 cents per $100 assessed valuation to increase by .85 cents to 45.49 cents per $100 assessed valuation.

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Only a handful of people, mostly district staff, attended the special meeting at Antrim Elementary School. And there were few questions and no real criticisms about the proposed budget.

Holly Harris, an Antrim teacher and Beach resident, asked why the amount of taxes Mantoloking is paying to the Point Pleasant Beach school district is down a third from last year's amount.

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Brian Savage, school business administrator, said it's because in the current school year, there are five Mantoloking students in the Beach district, but starting in September, there will only be three.

He said a state-mandated formula for determining Mantoloking's share of the local school tax levy calls for 99.5 percent of the share to be based on enrollment and the other .5 percent based on assessed property value.

Former Gov. Jon Corzine and the state legislature passed a law in 2009 that led to "non-operating districts," which are those with no schools, such as Mantoloking, to merge into nearby districts, said Schools Superintendent John Ravally after the meeting.

He said the state dictates the formula and exactly how much Mantoloking contributes to the local tax levy.

This year, of the $10,595,936 million school tax levy, Mantoloking pays $65,371 and the Beach pays $10,530,564, said Ravally, showing a Feb. 23 letter the state mailed to him dictating those figures.

Campbell said the district has no way to challenge the funding formula.

"The only way for us to challenge it is if it was unconstitutional, and it's not," he said.

Ravally said that Mantoloking is actually paying more per pupil than it used to when it was merely a sending district, rather than an entity actually merged into the Beach district.

Mantoloking used to pay the standard rate of about $13,000 per pupil as a sending district. However, in the coming school year, it will pay about $21,790. That amount comes from the $65,371.72 Mantoloking portion of the tax levy divided by three, since three Mantoloking students will be attending Beach schools in September.

Of the three Mantoloking students, two will be in Antrim and one in Point Pleasant Beach High School.

On the other hand, Campbell noted, Mantoloking has a much lower school tax rate and $1.5 billion of property value.

"If they had the same rate as the Beach, they would be paying a lot more, but they would have revolted if the state had tried to do that," he said.

Mantoloking residents also vote on the proposed school tax levy and there is one Mantoloking resident, Joyce Popaca, on the board.

As for the total budget, "the proposed 2011-2012 school budget of $14,179,025 is actually $56,580 less than the approved 2010-2011 school budget of $14,235,605," according to the web site.

Residents vote only on the tax levy of $10,595,936, not on the entire school district budget.

Point Pleasant Beach received an additional $97,281 in state aid compared to last year's amount. The board is using that additional state aid "for tax relief," according to the website.

The proposed budget is below the state tax levy cap of 2 percent.

Frank Belluscio, Director of Communications for the New Jersey School Boards Association, said that if a school tax levy is defeated by voters, it is then reviewed by the local municipal governing body. The municipal governing body can either leave the tax levy as is or cut it.

"It cannot add to the proposed levy," Belluscio wrote in an email. "The municipality’s authority in reviewing a defeated school budget is confined to the revenue side.

 "If the municipality reduces the proposed school tax levy, it has to back up its decision by identifying specific expenditure reductions," Belluscio said. "The board is not bound to make those specific spending cuts, but it must operate within the tax levy that is determined by the municipality after its review.  The decision to restore a program or staff (an expenditure decision) belongs to the board, which must operate within its available revenue."

Also on the April 27 ballot will be an uncontested race in which Beth Keefe, Bay Avenue, is running for one, three-year board seat. Polls are open from 2 to 9 p.m.

Board member Phyllis Thomson, who is not running for re-election, was honored with a presentation and certificate on Tuesday night for her seven years of service on the board.


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