Proposition 1

The Proposed Budget Maintains a Focus on Teaching and Learning

The Board of Education and District administration have been working together over several months to build a budget that addresses the evolving needs of our students in the post-pandemic era, while also maintaining a strong focus on rigorous teaching and learning and excellent opportunities for our students outside the classroom. To accomplish this while balancing the support that we ask of the taxpayers, we have established the following priorities in this year’s budget:

Budget highlights include:

• Maintain existing programs for all students.
• Develop special class programs that allow an increasing number of students with disabilities to stay in the District.
• Expand our Student Support Services offerings and coordination so that we can remove obstacles to teaching and learning.
• Provide targeted professional learning for faculty and staff in priority areas of student need.
• Address the maintenance of facilities in a proactive way so as to maintain a safe and healthy environment for teaching and learning.
• Maintain our security staffing to assist in maintaining a safe, secure, welcoming and affirming environment.
• Manage our revenue budget cautiously so as to avoid creating unmanageable future obligations.

Despite increasing costs in several operational areas including utilities, transportation, and security, we believe that we have achieved this balance with careful planning, the help of state aid, and an increase in the overall property value of the District. With the adoption of the NYS Budget on May 2nd, we will be receiving additional building aid in the amount of $591,118, that will be used to offset the original projected tax levy. Our projected tax levy increase will drop from 5.02% to 3.59%. Using the additional state aid money to lower the tax levy, in turn, lowers the estimated school property tax rate. There are no changes to the expenditure plan adopted by the Board of Education on April 11, 2023 which is included in the Budget Newsletter you should have received by mail.

More information regarding this revenue update and other budget details can be found on the District Budget Page of our website. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact Dr. Ron Clamser, Jr., Assistant Superintendent for Finance, Facilities, and Operations, or Ken Slentz, Superintendent of Schools. Please spend time reviewing the information enclosed in this e-Newsletter. The full Budget Newsletter is available on the District website at www.dfsd.org.

The School Budget Vote/Board of Education Election will be held IN PERSON (DFHS Gymnasium) on Tuesday, May 16, 2023 from 7:00 AM - 9:00 PM.

 Remember to Vote!