Eastern York SD reviews $1.17 million in proposed reductions, shifts high‑school therapeutic model in bid to save costs

The Eastern York School District operations committee reviewed a plan that would trim approximately $1,174,000 from next year’s budget and change how the district delivers a high‑school therapeutic program.

At the meeting Presenter (staff member) summarized recent budget work, saying the district previously added 11 special‑education positions that increased costs by “$792,000” and later identified reductions of about “$649,000” in prior additions. The presenter told the board the package of reductions presented at this meeting, together with earlier savings, would total about $1,174,000.

Administrators described a proposal to modify the district’s arrangement with Laurel Life, a contracted provider of transition‑program services at the high school. “The personnel that we pay for at Laurel Life is a therapist, a behavior coach and a teacher,” Administrator said; the district’s model would continue to contract for a therapist while shifting other duties to district staff. Presenter gave the program’s near‑term cost components as a promotion of a part‑time paraprofessional to full time (raising the position’s cost by about $33,000, largely for benefits), an additional part‑time position (~$28,000) and the contracted therapist cost (~$108,000), a set of line items the presenter summarized as “$170,000.” The administration estimated that delivering the program in‑house under the new model would save roughly $125,000 compared with the contract figure budgeted previously.

The committee also discussed not replacing three teaching positions tied to retirements and one resignation as another source of savings, and recommended hiring two part‑time classroom assistants to support increased class sizes where internal transfers would otherwise move staff. “It’s my recommendation that you support our teachers in the classroom by hiring an additional classroom assistant,” Administrator said, noting that some first‑grade classrooms could rise to about 23 students without additional paraprofessional support.

Other line‑item reductions described by staff included trimming a homebound instruction line (HI) that had not been fully spent in prior years, a $20,000 reduction in therapy services identified by the special‑education department, and a renegotiation of a TCI contract that staff said reduced the district’s annual TCI cost to about $48,000 per year (presenter characterized that as roughly a $72,000 annual savings compared with prior budgeting). Presenter summed the savings on one page of the plan at $524,000 and said those numbers feed into the $1.174 million total.

Board members pressed administration on revenue options as well as cuts. Several members framed the district’s fiscal issue as primarily a revenue problem rather than an expense one and urged long‑term work on revenue generation, including local partnerships and engagement with township officials. One member proposed convening a short committee of board representatives, administration, township supervisors, business owners and residents to look for strategic opportunities, such as contracts or development that could broaden the local tax base. “We have a revenue problem,” Committee member said during the discussion.

Financial projections presented at the meeting showed planned spending near $63 million and projected revenue around $61 million for next year, which staff said would leave the district drawing on fund balance. Presenter said a proposed 1.25‑mill property tax increase remains the administration’s recommendation to narrow the gap; staff illustrated impact using district assessed‑value examples the presenter gave during the presentation. Staff also said $1.2 million of the fund balance would be designated for capital projects but could later be used for debt service or to advance a future building project.

Transportation and out‑of‑district tuition costs were discussed as major drivers of spending. Administrator noted legal obligations such as McKinney‑Vento that can require the district to transport students and that some out‑of‑district placements can cost tens of thousands of dollars per student annually; the presenter estimated total related costs in the low‑hundreds of thousands for recent years.

No formal motions or votes were recorded at the meeting. The administration offered to bring the district’s financial adviser to a future operations meeting to review debt structure and options for using savings or debt service reductions to support capital plans. The board agreed to consider whether to hold an additional meeting before the next regular operations session or roll the remaining items into the scheduled operations meeting.