The up-Island school committee voted 4-1 to certify the fiscal year 2024 budget after a public hearing on Thursday evening, just in time for the holiday season. Committee member Skipper Manter was the sole dissenting vote.
Committee member Jim Newman, who was initially absent from the meeting, was called in to virtually participate and vote on the budget certification.
Martha’s Vineyard Public Schools business administrator Mark Friedman gave a rundown of the budget, which was the fifth and final iteration approved on Monday, Dec. 19. The proposed fiscal year 2024 operational budget is $14.9 million, a 7.33 percent increase. The assessed budget is increasing by 5.26 percent at $14.4 million. A part of the budget will be offset by $439,933.91 through excess and deficiencies (E and D) funds.
“If there’s a narrative to this budget along with the other budgets at the other schools this year, it’s the collective bargaining agreements. It’s not to blame the budgets, but there’s a particular, incremental increase that happens in FY24. So, all the schools are seeing what will be probably the largest increase of the three years of increases we’ll experience in those collective bargaining agreements,” Friedman said, referring to the teacher contracts that were negotiated with the Martha’s Vineyard Educators Association in October.
Friedman also shared the student population numbers. The overall number of students did not change much for Chilmark School and West Tisbury School, from a collective 405 students to 407 students. The 407 students consisted of 70 Chilmark School students (10 from Aquinnah, 36 from Chilmark, 10 from West Tisbury, and 14 from school choice) and 337 West Tisbury School students (32 from Aquinnah, 34 from Chilmark, 220 from West Tisbury, and 51 from school choice). Although the overall population did not shift a lot, there were fluctuations between the two schools. West Tisbury School saw a decrease in students from 352 students to 337 students while Chilmark School saw an increase from 57 students to 70. The increase in students is why Chilmark School is looking to hire more educators for next year.
Manter asked how many homeschooled students the district had. Although not counted in the budget, Friedman said there are 12 homeschooled up-Island students. West Tisbury School principal Donna Lowell-Bettencourt said there was likely a slight increase in this population due to the COVID-19 pandemic that swept through.
Moving on, there were no other Islanders present besides a few West Tisbury officials and the hearing ended without public input.
The first attempt at certifying the budget failed with a 3-1 vote, Manter voting no. For the budget to be certified, four yes votes were required. Martha’s Vineyard superintendent Richie Smith said since the public hearing process was completed by the December deadline, the certification could take place during the next meeting in January. Friedman read off the up-Island regional agreement that the budget could be “certified no later than the last day of February.”
Committee member Roxanne Ackerman asked Manter what it would take for him to vote in favor of certifying the budget and he referred her to his past comments. In previous meetings, Manter had cast nay votes due to disagreements with parts of the budgeting process and expressed concerns over using E and D funds to offset the budget.
In an attempt to get the budget certified, the committee and Smith contacted Newman to see if he would be able to attend the meeting virtually and vote. After several attempts to call Newman, he was able to join the meeting on Zoom through his iPhone.
Committee chair Alex Salop briefly updated Newman on the situation before voting.
“Jim, just to let you know, nothing has changed in the budget except for what we talked about in the last meeting,” Salop said. “We’re voting to certify. We need four votes to certify and we have one member who is not voing to certify. So, we were hoping you would be the fourth vote for us to do that.”
The committee unanimously voted to reconsider the budget, which led to the 4-1 vote that certified it.