LEBANON — The Lebanon School District is wrangling with a proposed 7.11% budget increase for the 2026-27 school year.
Lebanon School District administrators have proposed a $58.66 million spending plan to serve nearly 1,700 students.
The $3.9 million increase of the current year’s budget is largely due to increases in employee wages and benefits. It could result in a 9% increase to the school portion of the municipal property tax rate.
After each school and the district office presented their proposed budgets late last month, the School Board and district leaders requested alternate proposal “in recognition of the economic challenges facing many families,” Superintendent Amy Allen wrote in a letter to the community late last month.
School officials will mull those alternate options and likely set a retained fund balance at a meeting on Wednesday night. District business administrator Tim Ball has prepared new budgets that would represent roughly 7%, 5%, 4% and 2% budget increases over this year.
The School Board will consider these options and the necessary cuts at 6:30 p.m. in the Lebanon Middle School cafeteria.
The proposed changes include $216,000 in cuts with no “practical impact,” according to documents prepared for Wednesday’s meeting. These are costs that have been renegotiated or could be covered by grant funding and easily bring the budget down below a 7% increase.
But cutting costs further would require more substantial changes, such as eliminating positions, delaying building improvement projects and reducing tuition to Ledyard Charter School.
Climbing expenses
More than half of the increase in the budget proposal is due to increases in wages and benefits, Allen wrote in her message.
Health care costs are expected to go up by almost 20% next year, or $1.15 million, according to budget documents.
Lebanon uses SchoolCare to provide employee health insurance, a Manchester-based risk pool management provider that is pushing substantial rate increases onto its customers for the next fiscal year.
The district allocated $17.3 million to cover employee benefits. Currently, the district, which operates four schools, has 387 full-time employees with only one vacancy, said spokesman Rooney.
Wages are expected to increase by $828,000 to $26.46 million as a result of raises and 1.6 new full-time equivalent positions that were proposed to reduce class sizes at Hanover Street School and Lebanon High School.
The 0.6 full-time equivalent employees would be added at Lebanon High School.
The administration proposed boosting one part-time English teacher to full time and adding a part-time teacher in the math and science department, Rooney said Friday.
Other budget drivers include almost $1 million in capital improvement projects to update district buildings and infrastructure, and over $500,000 in special education costs and tuition payments to the Hartford Area Career and Technology Center.
Potential cost savings
To reach a 4.94% increase, proposed cuts include eliminating 5.6 full-time positions.
This would include the 1.6 new positions and four paraeducator positions, which would be cut through attrition, or by not filling vacancies.
Other cuts to reach 4.94% include putting off several building improvement projects, cutting allocations for athletic equipment, community engagement and advertising expenses and reducing tuition payments to Ledyard Charter School.
Traditionally, the state covers tuition costs for approved charter schools. But, for more than a decade, the Lebanon School District has opted to give supplemental tuition to the school, which serves high school students at risk of dropping out.
The proposal would reduce this allocation from $100,000 to $70,000.
A 4.3% increase would include the other cuts, as well as deferring additional building improvement and maintenance projects, and equipment replacements. School officials caution against these delays.
“Delaying critical facilities upgrades will have a direct and lasting impact on the safety, functionality, and learning environment of our schools,” a note on the proposal says. “Aging systems and deferred maintenance lead to more frequent equipment failures, higher long-term repair costs, and increased operational disruptions, diverting time and resources from instruction.”
To get to 4.3%, the district also would cut summer school budgets by $72,360 across all grade levels.
The cuts would eliminate transportation for middle school students in summer school and English language learning summer programs for middle school students. The entire middle school summer school program would be reduced from three weeks of half-day classes to three, one-hour group sessions per week for three weeks.
At the high school level, the cuts would eliminate the rising ninth grade summer school program that usually serves about nine students.
To get below a 2% budget increase, the district would have to cut three administrative assistants and three full-time teaching positions. They would also put off classroom renovations and replacing ‘end of life’ technology.
Cutting the administrative assistants would “significantly disrupt the efficiency and effectiveness of district operations” and push “substantial workloads” onto remaining staff, according to the document.
“Administrative assistants are the frontline engine that keeps our schools and SAU office running.”
Cutting three teaching positions would “have an immediate, measurable impact on students across the district” by increasing class sizes, cutting classes and programs and reducing opportunities for students.
The cuts would “most significantly affect our students, narrowing their access to high quality instruction, diminishing supportive relationships, and limiting the well-rounded education that prepares them.”
One piece of the tax bill
The initially proposed budget is expected to raise the tax rate by $1.03 per $1,000 of assessed valuation, according to meeting materials. This is a 9.2% increase on the school portion of the tax bill.
That increase assumes the district retains a fund balance of $750,000, which the board could change, said district spokesman Jack Rooney Friday. Per district policy, any excess funds from this year over that amount can be used to offset the tax rate.
The school district budget impacts one portion of property tax bills, along with spending on municipal services, statewide education outlays and county government.
The Lebanon City Council is currently reviewing a proposed $78 million spending plan to take effect Jan. 1. It is expected to increase the municipal portion of property taxes by about 3.7%. The current tax rate in Lebanon is $21.53 per $1,000 of assessed value.
The School District budget conversations are happening as many Lebanon residents are already feeling pain in their wallets from a recently-completed revaluation of properties that brought assessments of single-family homes up by 37% on average.
The School Board is expected approve a final budget proposal and take community input in January. Lebanon voters will have the final say in approving or rejecting the proposed budget during March elections.