Weatherly board grills CCTI administrators, fails to pass budget
Weatherly Area school board members spent more than two hours grilling CCTI administrators on the school’s budget and operations.
Dave Reinbold, administrative director of CCTI, and the school’s business manager, Jeffry Deutsch, were invited to give a presentation to the Weatherly Area board and discuss the technical school’s budget. The Weatherly Area board has been reluctant to approve the budget.
Reinbold called the budget “very Weatherly-friendly” and detailed how the district’s share of the costs has steadily decreased over the years. After removing a $50,000 capital improvement project from the budget, Reinbold said Weatherly Area’s cost for the 2019-20 school year will reflect a decrease of $1,687. The district’s cost had been slated to increase by $2,408 before the removal of the capital project.
Reinbold went on to show board members that Weatherly Area’s share of the CCTI budget has decreased a total of $72,000 from 2013 through the 2019-20 proposed budget. He also noted that Weatherly’s share is the lowest of the five sending school districts.
None of that satisfied Weatherly board members or administrators, who continued to drill down on the figures and asked for more information to be provided before they could vote to approve CCTI’s budget.
Superintendent Teresa Young asked for information on staff compared to budget, and even district solicitor Christopher Slusser asked for clarification of the per-student costs to the district.
When the presentation and question-and-answer period finished, Weatherly board member Gerry Grega made a motion to approve the CCTI budget.
“You received all the information you need to pass the budget,” he told fellow board members.
The motion died for lack of a second.
In other business, Pete Bard, business manager for the district, reported that the initial sale of bonds to finance the district’s building and repair project was successful.
The bonds, which pay an interest rate of 3.22 percent, sold at a premium, which will reduce the total cost of financing by approximately $500,000.
Board member Amy Potsko was absent from the meeting.
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