CLIFTON — City taxpayers can expect a rise in the school portion of their property tax bill after the school board's vote to pass a budget that exceeds the state-imposed 2% cap on levy increases.
The Board of Education has approved a budget that exceeds the cap by an additional 1%, which will mean the school tax bill for a home assessed at the city's average of $178,000 will increase by $150.
The budget means the school district will largely maintain its status quo, with no job or program cuts, officials said, and total expenditures at more than $302 million to educate 11,300 students.
“I’m grateful to the Board of Education for passing a budget that not only protects the staffing levels that are essential to our students’ success, but also preserves the progress we’ve made in recent years," Schools Superintendent Danny Robertozzi said.
Gov. Phil Murphy's administration identified 281 of the state's 590 operating school districts that were not taxing their residents enough to pay for schools and were not spending enough money to educate their studentsadequately. Those districts, which include Clifton, were recently notified that they may be eligible to exceed the state-mandated 2% cap on local tax levy increases for the upcoming school year, if they have exhausted other avenues of balancing their budgets.
The district is eligible, under recently passed legislation, to increase the local school levy by almost 40%, or $54 million, officials said.
"At no point did this board or administration entertain that thought," Assistant Superintendent for Business Ahmed Shehata said Thursday.
Uncapping school taxes
The 281 school districts were notified in March that they may be eligible to exceed the state-mandated 2% cap, accompanied by an incentive in which those that increased the levy would receive additional state aid.
By choosing to increase the levy by 1%, the district raises an additional $1.4 million and gets an additional $70,000 from the state, via the tax levy incentive aid.
"This budget reflects our community’s deep commitment to quality education and ensures we continue to invest in the future of our district,” Robertozzi said.
Even so, "Agreeing to a 3 percent increase was not an easy decision," board member Judy Bassford posted on her Facebook page. "I feel it too, just like everyone else. But I could not, in good conscience, support cutting services or positions that directly impact our students."
Despite what the state officials say a district of Clifton's size needs to spend to provide a thorough and efficient education, Bassford said the city has "a long history of delivering high-quality education for far less than many other districts."
In recent years, budgeting has been especially difficult, Shehata said. The local taxpayer dollars also support more than 1,000 city students who opt to attend a charter school. The district sends $18 million from its budget to pay for the students going to charter schools, which are also considered public schools.
Additionally, the district must transfer funds to pay the tuition for several hundred city students who choose to attend Passaic County Technical Institute. That totals about $7.6 million.
The district also learned there is a possibility it will lose $11 million in federally promised pandemic relief funds, after the Trump administration in March canceled extensions that had been granted for spending the money on infrastructure.
Gov. Phil Murphy issued a statement on March 31 condemning the Trump administration decision, which he said affected $85 million for 20 New Jersey school districts.
Neither the governor’s office nor the state Education Department has provided a breakdown of how much money each of those 20 districts could lose.
On the local level, increases in health care benefits and salary increases also ramped up fiscal pressures, Shehata said.
Despite all that, the board rolled up its sleeves and delivered a budget, said board President Alan Paris.
"All of our commissioners do their homework and bring to the dais a variety of insights and challenges in a professional, deliberative manner," Paris said. "Our administration provided clear, comprehensive and understandable analysis to the board and community to help us make the best data-driven budget choices."
The district has one high school, two middle schools, with a third to open in the fall, 14 elementary schools and one early education center.