Amagansett Board Grilled Over Budget

Amagansett School Board meetings are typically quiet and quick affairs, but on Tuesday at the district’s budget hearing a handful of residents grilled the school superintendent and school board on its tax-cap-busting budget proposal.

Citing both rising costs on the one hand and a need to preserve all current programs and services currently offered on the other, the district has proposed a 2016-17 budget of $10.47 million, which increases year-over-year spending by just .34 percent but carries a tax levy increase of 3.74 percent. That exceeds the state-imposed limit on tax levy increases, so a supermajority of at least 60 percent voter approval is needed to pass the budget.

Eleanor Tritt, the school superintendent, said Tuesday that the district’s auditor and accountant have projected an alternate financial future for the district if voters decide not to pierce the tax cap. Should the school then be forced to rely more heavily on its reserves, she said, there is a chance it could experience a budget deficit by the end of the 2017-18 school year.

The proposed budget is not sitting well with some residents, who cited a 2014 audit by the New York State comptroller that found the district overbudgeted for several years in a row, between the 2009-2010 and 2012-13 school years, and as a result had too much in its surplus funds. By state law, a district may have up to 4 percent of its budget left over at the end of a fiscal year, and anything over that amount is to be returned to taxpayers or placed in reserves that must be approved by voters through ballot propositions.

The auditors found that the district overestimated budgets by $4 million over those four years, and called its budgetary practices “ineffective.” Ms. Tritt called the comptroller’s report “boilerplate,” saying many districts in the state receive the same evaluation.

The disaffected residents asserted that Amagansett has plenty of money in its reserves, which it should have tapped, they said, to bring down a budget gap of about $327,390, which led to the attempt to pierce the tax cap. Combined in nine different reserve funds, some of which are restricted to uses such as retirement payments, building repairs, and workers compensation, the district has about $4 million in reserves.

“Why would you not take a little bit off these reserve funds so that you’re not piercing the cap? That’s a lot to ask for in this community,” Rona Klopman said.

“If we’ve already paid that money in taxes, why are you asking us to pay it again?” Christine Sciulli, a parent, asked.

The budget does include plans to take $140,000 from the retirement reserve, which has close to $625,000 in it, and $20,000 from the worker’s compensation reserve, which has $132,757.

Ms. Tritt said the reserve funds each address a different purpose or liability. She called them “your only way of preparing for a whole lot of unknowns.”

“If those reserves were returned to the taxpayer this year, the following year you would then have to make up that money out of the general fund,” she said. She then explained that the district’s auditor and accountant have said drawing down on the reserves in this way, so as not to pierce the cap, would leave Amagansett in the red by the end of the 2017-2018 school year.

“I think it’s bad that you’re piercing the cap. Doing that is putting your budget in jeopardy,” Ms. Klopman insisted.

If there is less than 60 percent voter approval on Tuesday, when school budget votes take place statewide, the district would have to either submit the same budget for a revote or present a revised budget; that second vote would be held on June 14. Should the budget fail a second time, the district would operate on a contingency budget, which means zero tax levy increase — and, said Ms. Tritt, the potential for more than $300,000 in cuts.

“We have programs that people are happy with,” the superintendent said. “We don’t have to have an after-school program, a summer program, pre-kindergarten three, or pre-kindergarten four. Some districts don’t have full-day kindergarten.”