A public hearing on Martha Vineyard Regional High School’s fiscal 2012 budget will take place Monday, November 29, at 7 pm, in the performing arts center.
The high school committee’s budget subcommittee met November 17 to finalize the numbers and voted to move the proposed budget to next week’s public hearing.
Adjustments made to the fiscal year 2012 (FY12) budget since the subcommittee met on November 1 brought the total operating expenses down from $16.607 million to $16.603 million, an increase of less than one percent compared with FY11.
Island towns will pay total assessments estimated at $13.175 million, an increase of about 1.69 percent over $12.955 million in FY11.
Earlier in the budget process, a home economics course was eliminated for next year. Among changes in last week’s final draft, an additional $4,400 for supplies associated with the course was removed, principal Stephen Nixon said in an email to The Times.
Although the public hearing takes place next week, final budget numbers remain uncertain because of ongoing contract negotiations with secretaries, paraprofessionals, and custodians.
The FY12 budget includes a two-percent wage increase for teachers, under the terms of a three-year union contract they signed in September, but no increase for secretaries, paraprofessionals, and custodians in the absence of contracts.
“We are waiting for the secretaries to ratify a mediated agreement, and if they do, then we will, and we should be in pretty good shape,” superintendent of schools James Weiss told The Times in a phone call Friday. “That will all take place hopefully after Thanksgiving, and if ratified, the details will be made available on December 1 at the All-Island School Committee meeting.”
“The custodians and paraprofessionals are still in negotiations with no clear settlement in sight,” Mr. Weiss said in an email Monday in follow-up to a question from The Times.
