School Budget

[Sandra]

I sent a message to all the school board members with email addresses. I haven't heard back from any of them, so I'm hoping someone else might be able to answer my question.

The blue informational sheet they mailed out shows that the school budget increases 5% over last year, but regardless of how I figure it, it seems to be a greater than 9% increase - both in the school budget's bottom line (with and without the Act 68 expenditures) and in the impact on my property taxes.

Can anyone help me understand this?

[Sandra]

I have modified my original question so as not to distract from my real question which is:

Regardless of where the 5% budget increase figure comes from, the impact to each taxpayer s tax bill will be just slightly under 10% - that is based both on the figures the school board provided and my own calculations. According to the flyer, the tax rate last year was 1.12 and this year it will be 1.23 that is a 9.8% increase. For a $200,000 house, the taxes would increase $220 from last year's $2240 education tax - that's about as close to 10% as you can get.

So, my question is how does a 5% increase in the school budget increase my education tax rate by 10%?

A school board member has replied to say that my question has been sent to the budget manager.