Interim Superintendent Dr. Jeffrey Rabe presents West Seneca’s $156.0M 2024–25 budget, 1.95% tax-levy increase

Interim Superintendent Dr. Jeffrey Rabe presented the West Seneca Central School District’s proposed 2024–25 budget, saying it would increase spending 5.5% from the prior year to about $156.0 million and would raise the tax levy by 1.95% to $69,966,619 if adopted.

Rabe said the proposal is designed to balance taxpayer interests and students’ needs while maintaining current elementary class sizes, regular instructional programs, transportation, student-support services (including literacy, numeracy and mandated academic intervention), and interscholastic athletics and co-curricular activities. “The proposed 2024–25 school budget includes an increase in spending of 5.5% from last year's school budget for a total budget of $156,020,575,” Rabe said.

He told listeners the district faces several fiscal pressures, including the expiration of pandemic-related grants totaling $4,800,000 and what he described as an erosion of purchasing power under the state tax-levy limit. Rabe said final 2024 state aid is $64,894,676 and that anticipated foundation-aid reductions total $578,399. He listed key cost drivers: $3,113,039 in salary increases, $1,911,659 in benefit increases, $1,986,990 in special-education and out-of-district placement costs, and $1,009,019 in transportation-contract increases.

To close the gap, Rabe said the district will use a mix of the tax levy, restricted and unrestricted reserves, and expenditure reductions. He walked through the state-controlled levy calculation and listed allowable exclusions — including capital and retirement-reserve exclusions — that lead to the stated levy limit of $69,966,619 (a 1.95% increase). On reserves, the presentation itemized draws from several accounts (employee benefit accrued liability $1,000,000; employee retirement reserve $985,000; teachers’ retirement reserve $1,700,000; unemployment reserve $128,000; workers’ compensation reserve $1,000,000; bus reserve $760,000). The presenter reported differing aggregate reserve-use totals in the talk (an earlier aggregate of $6,389,121 and a later subtotal-style total of $5,600,000); the presentation did not reconcile that difference.

Rabe said the district made about $4,481,476 in expenditure reductions, which included reductions of 30.5 full-time-equivalent certified positions and 17 FTE classified positions. Category-level changes include an $840,000 decrease in administration and general support and increases in instructional support (+$4,200,000), transportation (+$1,300,000), benefits (+$1,900,000) and debt service (+$1,600,000), producing roughly an $8.2 million general-fund increase.

On the revenue side, Rabe said the district expects $1.9 million more in state aid, $1.0 million more from sales-tax and other charges, an additional $102,000 from appropriated fund balance, $2.6 million in increased use of reserves, and $1.2 million in miscellaneous revenue, together with the tax-levy increase totaling about $8.2 million in added revenue.

Rabe offered sample tax-bill impacts (before STAR): for an average-assessed home he used a $52,000 assessed value example (converted to $200,000 full value) and said the bill would be a little over $2,500 (about a $48 increase); for a $100,000 assessed home the presenter gave $4,844 (about a $92 increase); for a $250,000 assessed home he stated $12,112 (about a $231.18 increase).

He also described Proposition 2, a separate vehicle-purchase proposition on the May 21 ballot asking voters to approve $759,892 to buy four 30-passenger buses and two 65-passenger buses. Rabe reviewed prior bus purchases and aid received for those purchases.

Rabe summarized the two propositions: Proposition 1 is the 2024–25 budget (about $156.0 million, 5.5% increase) with the levy set at $69,966,619 (1.95% increase); Proposition 2 is the $759,892 vehicle purchase. He said if voters reject the budget, the district would be required to adopt a contingency budget with no levy increase and would need to cut an additional $1,335,437 (including roughly $756,002 in further staffing reductions, $479,435 in travel/training/equipment cuts and $100,000 in capital outlay), and community use of facilities would require full reimbursement under contingency rules.

Rabe closed by reminding voters the budget and propositions are on the ballot Tuesday, May 21, with polls open 7 a.m.–9 p.m. at the East Senior High School gymnasium and that more information is available at www.wscschools.org.