What Goes Into Creating the School Budget?

By: Jenna Noguera, Kathryn Taleporos, Jared Yetto, Isabelle Lewis

May 23, 2022

South Colonie residents voted to approve the 2022-2023 school budget on May 17. The budget process, which began in September, incorporated many different opinions and established the school district’s priorities for the school year.

The 2022-2023 South Colonie school budget was approved for $113,458,885. This multi-million dollar fund is composed from several sources. The two main sources being local taxes and state aid. Property taxes and STAR generated $77,413,709, while state aid contributed $30,270,774.

State aid and federal aid greatly increased this year, granting South Colonie with $9.3 million dollars extra to support the schools through the pandemic.

The approved budget is a 5.4 million dollar increase from last year’s school budget, which means there is a 2.5% tax increase for Colonie homeowners.

The budget consists of three main parts: program, administrative, and capital. According to the South Colonie budget bulletin, 80.7% of the budget goes to programs; this includes salaries and benefits for school staff, equipment, co-curricular activities and transportation costs. More specifically, the salaries and benefits are what most of the budget goes too, with an approximated budget of $63,524,940 for salaries, and $31,437,124 for benefits for the year 2022-2023.

Drafting the budget for the school district is one of the main jobs of the Assistant Superintendent for Management Services & Strategic Planning, Jacqlene McAllister.

“The budget process is a very detailed process, making sure we have every dollar accounted for in our proposed $113 million budget. It is a tedious and time consuming process that takes a lot of attention to detail and planning ahead,” says McAllister.

The South Colonie budget process begins long before voters head to the polls and involves multiple people throughout the district.

According to McAllister, “The budget process never really ends, but it officially begins in the fall, with the budget vote being the following May.”

McAllister said that the process begins with a discussion between the Superintendent, Deputy Superintendent, Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources & Safe Schools, and the Assistant Superintendent for Management Services & Strategic Planning.

After this initial discussion, McAllister said that they, “...then discuss with the Board of Ed and administrators to define the priorities for the following year.”

The budget requires the cooperation of many others. The district receives input from administrators and the Board of Education, while also hosting public forums for feedback. Rose Gigliello, Board of Education President, mentioned that these forums are not well attended.

“The budget is created in cooperation with all the instructional and non-instructional administrators in the district as well as input from the Board of Education based on their priorities and goals,” McAllister says.

When asked on a scale of 1-10 how difficult the budget process is McAllister said “As the Assistant Superintendent for Management Services, it is one of the most important pieces of my job, so it is a 10 just because of the responsibility that comes with it.”

While the school district’s budget is $113,458,885, this does not include renovations included in the Capital Project. Separate from the budget, South Colonie’s 2025 Capital Project is in the works for the school district.

The Capital Project will allow for renovations to take place in all of the schools and district buildings. At Colonie Central High School they plan to renovate the auditorium, locker rooms, the library, certain classrooms, and more. They will also equip the Ambrosio Field with synthetic turf, and improve the HVAC system.

The estimated cost of the Capital Project is $107,000,000. Most of the money will come from the NYS Building Aid, providing $62 million. It is estimated that the impact on property taxes will be $45 million, which will be phased out over the next 15 years.

To learn more about the 2025 Capital Project, the Board of Education will be holding public discussions on this matter into early summer. The approved plan will be presented on September 26, before being voted on by district residents on October 18, 2022.