School board OKs budget increase

The Board of Education approved another increase to the district’s budget for the 2024-25 school year in a 7-1 vote at its meeting July 16.

Board member Teresa Dwyer voted no. “I can’t support it. I’m sorry,” she told the board. ”I resent the fact that we are willing to put this on the back of the taxpayers.”

She pointed out that the Highlands Act of 2010 prevents West Milford from increasing its ratable properties. “We can’t put any more money on taxpayers’ backs.”

Kate Romeo was absent from the meeting.

A new state law signed May 14 permits school districts affected by cuts in state aid in recent years to raise taxes more than usually allowed one time.

With the board’s approval, the budget will grow by almost $1.2 million to a total of about $78 million. The local tax levy will rise by about $1 million to about $65.3 million.

On April 30, the board approved a budget of about $77 million with a local tax levy of about $64.7 million, a 3.27 percent increase from a year earlier.

With the additional tax increase, the owner of an average home in West Milford, assessed at $243,300, will pay $277.56 more in school taxes than a year earlier. That is $89.85 more than the $187.71 increase in the budget adopted April 30.

The additional funds will be used primarily for non-personnel expenses so they would not recur every year, said the district’s business administrator, William Scholts.

New superintendent

Board president Claire Lockwood welcomed new Superintendent Brian Kitchin, who started his job July 1. “It’s going to be a great year to come and hopefully many more.

”I am looking forward to maybe getting some stability back to this district and moving forward,” she added.

Kitchin described Swing Education, a company that helps provide substitute teachers to school districts. Swing Education does all the required background checks. “It’s really a no-lose situation.”

Daniel Novak, the district’s director of education, said he is looking for grants and other ways to fund the STEM Camp, which has been funded with federal COVID-19 relief money in the past few years.

That funding ended with the 2023-24 school year.

Between 120 and 130 campers attended each week, Novak said. “You wouldn’t believe ... how many of them have never caught a frog before, didn’t know how to catch a crayfish.”

“They start the week being afraid of such things (as bugs) and then by the end of the week, they can’t wait to grab ‘em and look at them and get up close.”

The camp was open to incoming elementary school students in grades 1-5. The cost was estimated at $227 a week per student.

Novak said the federal COVID money also was used to expand the summer reading program, which previously was open only to students in schools eligible for Title I federal funds. Those are schools with the highest percentages of students participating in the free and reduced meals program.

”I was able to open it to non-title schools through some flexibility allowable within the grant,” he said.

Now, the full-day summer learning camp teaches reading in the morning, has social-emotional and team-building activities at lunch and teaches an hour of math in the afternoon. The program had 187 students this summer.