Based on the state budget approved by the Virginia General Assembly last month, Charlottesville schools will gain about $2.9 million in state funding next year, according to administrators.
“This year is one of those years where I think we knew there were going to be some changes coming in,” the division’s finance director, Ed Gillaspie, said.
The state will give Charlottesville more than $1.2 million in fiscal 2011, which begins July 1, as a “hold harmless” payment for the adjustment of the Local Composite Index, the state formula that determines education funding to localities. Under that adjustment, the city would have lost the same amount of funding, but the state decided to cushion the loss for next year.
Gillaspie said Charlottesville would also receive half that amount in the fiscal 2012 budget.
Additionally, in fiscal 2011, a reduction in Virginia Retirement System rates would translate into about $1.9 million in state funding for the city’s schools. The schools will still see funding reductions of more than $545,000, but the restoration of another program will give the schools $245,000.
“It’s an opportunity to put back some things that were cut,” Gillaspie said.
Administrators are proposing to spend some of the money on new items in the coming year, including expanding the schools’ preschool program for 3-year-olds by two classrooms, something School Board members lauded Thursday.
“I’m very, very pleased to see that,” board member Colette Blount said.
The division would also allocate $500,000 to its capital projects budget, increase open positions from two to four and add a general education teacher at Buford Middle School.
Superintendent Rosa S. Atkins said the middle school will need renovations in the future regardless of what may happen with the city’s grade configurations, which are currently being discussed, which is why the $500,000 was transferred.
“When it comes time to renovate Buford, we will have funds for that,” Atkins said.
Most of the earlier cuts the division had in its $68.3 million fiscal 2011 budget it approved in March — such as for instructional assistant and teaching positions — remain in place. But, with the gain in state funding, the division is proposing to restore some positions, including an instructional assistant at the Henry Avenue Learning Center and half a clerical position in Central Office.
Other changes include: additional field trip support would not be funded with federal economic stimulus dollars and funding for division-wide instructional supplies would be restored in the school budget’s general fund.
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