JAY – Selectmen voted last night to have the school board use funding from the undesignated revenue account to help offset losses in state subsidies. The vote was three selectmen in favor and two opposed.
The Jay School Department faces large-scale losses in their state subsidy due to valuation increases in town and fewer students being enrolled in the department. The department administration has proposed cutting roughly $1 million from the budget to cover these reductions, which would result in the loss of several programs and teachers. This problem has been compounded by another $215,000 of lost subsidy funding, withheld due to the town’s vote to not consolidate with MSAD 36.
Residents of Jay, as well as those in Livermore and Livermore Falls, voted to not consolidate into a single district on Jan. 27. In doing so, the department was found to not be complying with the reorganization law and was assessed the penalty. That penalty will remain in effect until Jay either consolidates, gets an alternative plan approved or the penalty system itself ends.
Selectmen discussed the undesignated revenue account and reviewed advice Town Manager Ruth Marden had received from the town’s auditor. She recommended that the selectmen make $216,000 from the undesignated revenue fund available to the school board, in an effort to lessen the impact of the subsidy losses on the school.
This subject had actually been discussed earlier in the meeting, when Budget Committee Member Mike Schaedler had asked selectmen to include an article in the warrant for the town meeting referendum in April. That article would have asked residents how they wanted to cover the loss in subsidy, with multiple options available.
“The people of the town of Jay chose to accept the fine,” Schaedler had said, “and it would be fair and rational to give them responsibility to decide what to do with it.”
Marden told Schaedler that it was too late to add articles to the town warrant. The discussion in executive session differed from the one at the open meeting in that it focused on legal issues associated with the undesignated revenue.
