Proposed school budget would raise tax levy 4.77%

The Board of Education introduced a proposed 2025-26 budget that would increase the local tax levy 4.77 percent to about $68.5 million.

The proposed budget of about $83 million is up 3.84 percent from the current school year.

At the school board’s meeting March 11, Superintendent Brian Kitchin said the spending plan maintains all current courses and programs.

“It’s incredibly difficult to do that with the loss of funds that we’ve had and the inflation of all different costs.”

The tax levy, paid by township residents, provides about 83 percent of the school district’s budget. It rose 4.48 percent in 2023-24 and 4.73 percent in 2024-25.

Owners of the average home in West Milford, assessed at $243,900, would pay $271.49 more than last year if the budget is approved.

A public hearing and final vote on the budget is planned April 29.

The proposed budget includes a 10.3 percent increase for employee benefits. The cost of benefits is close to a quarter of the total expenses, nearly the same amount spent on general-education programs.

Salaries and benefits together are more than three-quarters of the budget.

Kitchin said the district is using grant funding to support some computer science programs and aims to increase the number of tuition students in special-education programs, including at Highlander Academy.

Food-service revenues also will be used to offset other expenses, he said.

The district’s business administrator, William Scholts, was able to increase the interest rate that the district receives from Provident Bank through a multiyear agreement.

State aid up $300,000

State aid of about $5.8 million for 2025-26 rose by about $300,000 from the 2024-25 school year, Kitchin said, pointing out that state aid has dropped by about $9 million from the level in 2017-18.

”Unfortunately, this is really the design of what the state was intending to do to districts like ours. They were trying to put it back onto local taxpayers in these S2 districts.”

Scholts noted that money from other government entitlement grants declined in 2024-25, including a drop of $231,580 in Title I funding. Emergency relief that Congress had approved to help schools deal with the coronavirus pandemic ended in September.

He said the district will apply for extraordinary aid from the state but it is not known how much the Legislature will allocate for that.

Kitchin said money from the capital reserve will be used for the window and door project at Upper Greenwood Lake (UGL) Elementary School and to replace all-purpose room doors at other elementary schools.

The UGL septic project also is continuing with capital reserve funds, while the $2.7 million turf and lighting project at Dygos Field is being paid for by the township.

Board members William Cytowicz, Stephanie Marquard and Ray Guarino were absent from the meeting.