Thursday, October 3, 2013

Supplemental agenda: budget!

Again, you can find the backup here!
City now over NSS for the first time since 2010
Boone: obviously, we have greater needs
critical secondary needs: recommendation to school committee
ask School Committee to support resolution
O'Connell : note of appreciation to Council
where will positions be?
Boone: pretty close to exactly where they need to be
"reticent to say which schools, lest they get really excited ahead of it"
teaching load of 125 cap; class loads exceeding that
O'Connell: is it disruptive to switch classes? Boone: some students will have a new teacher
instrument lessons? Could we use some of these funds for that now? Suggestion to hold the item pending administrative report on costs of adding that
Allen: can we refer instrument lessons to F&O? Other outstanding items in F&O, could be added in quarterly budget process
instrumental lessons referred
Boone: hope that we won't hold up hiring teachers

Petty: "the school budget has so many outside factors...next month, we won't be at net school spending"
think the commitment from the Manager was one time because the budget wasn't really set
even after the figuring that $40,000 was the hole
Council did it to bring down class sizes
"my commitment was that this would go to teachers"

Foley: thanks mayor for leadership
joint meetings "we've established an awful lot of common ground"
understand what Net School Spending is about, what it means, "that clarity is so important"
they want the money to be targeted as well
can possibly deal with remaining schools through other means

I mentioned what I said in my earlier post, including that not cutting our budget on charter reimbursement is a big deal. To my questions: the answers are yes, a charter school reimbursement in July is unusual; and the earlier city administrative number was an error. 

Biancheria: attended Tuesday evening's meeting to thank the City Council, Mayor, City Manager
Have seen different areas to dedicate money to
"this was not something that they took lightly"
$172,000 is not the cure all
donation of $25,000 for cafeteria tables from an outside source
could we do that for instrument lessons?

passes unanimously
with reconsideration so that it can be implemented tomorrow

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