SWAMPSCOTT — The Swampscott School Committee voted unanimously Wednesday to submit an operating budget of $31.09 million for fiscal year 2022, a 2.5 percent increase from last year.
The budget is $180,000 lower than the original proposal, which was changed by request of Town Administrator Sean Fitzgerald due to Gov. Charlie Baker’s proposed state budget for the year. Swampscott Public Schools Director of Finance Martha Sybert explained that the decrease will be made up by federal grants, and does not represent any change in planned spending.
“We’re still going to make the purchases, we’re just going to use grant funds,” Sybert said.
The budget includes $1.29 million for administration (a 3.5 percent decrease), $16.04 million for general education (1.6 percent increase), $9.74 million for special education (3.5 percent increase), $2.42 million for school facilities (10.6 percent increase) and $1.59 million for districtwide programs (1.2 percent decrease).
Of that amount, 82.7 percent or $25.7 million is devoted to faculty and staff compensation.
In her presentation to the committee Wednesday night, Sybert broke down the grant funding that the district will receive from the state and federal governments. From normal grants, the district will receive an estimated $2.51 million; in addition, there will be an estimated additional $1.42 million in COVID-related grants.
It is these pandemic-related grants that will make up the $180,000 difference between the original budget proposal and the one voted on by the committee. The majority of that amount will be $108,000 for technology upgrades to Chromebooks and MacBook Air laptops, which will instead be funded by the ESSER II (Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund) grant.
The School Committee intended to establish a line item for these technology upgrades in this year’s budget, but will instead postpone that action to next year.
“We really, as a board, have wrestled with how to get this into our budget,” Sybert said. “We were optimistic that this was the first year we were going to get it into our budget, but due to the pandemic we are kicking it down the road a bit.”
The committee’s budget will be reviewed by the town administrator, and then presented to the Finance Committee next month. If approved by the Finance Committee, the budget will then be sent to May’s Town Meeting for final approval and adoption.
