Freeport Area School District cuts deficit by more than half, thanks to state budget passage

The school subsidies included in the recently passed state budget reduces Freeport Area School District’s operating deficit by more than half.

District Business Manager Brad Walker told the school board Wednesday the district will receive state allocations of $7.91 million for general education aid and $1.32 million for special education.

Overall, it amounts to $9.23 million in state aid, which Superintendent Ian Magness described as “underwhelming” in relation to the district’s needs.

In June, the school board increased real estate taxes to cover its $37.3 million budget. Taxes went up by 3% in the district’s Armstrong County communities of South Buffalo and Freeport, and 2.85% in Buffalo Township, the only Butler County community in the district.

Nonetheless, it was more than district officials expected.

“We budgeted for a 2% increase, and it came in at more than that,” Walker said. “It went up 7.11% from last year.”

As a result, he said, the deficit of about $770,000 included in the 2023-24 budget will now drop to a little more than $340,000.

The district had budgeted for a subsidy of $7.5 million but will receive just over $7.9 million, amounting to about an additional $430,000 that won’t be covered by its fund balance.

Special education aid was projected to come in at about $1.3 million in the district budget approved by the board in June. Instead, the district received about $54,600 more.

Walker also told the board the district is appealing its figures from the State Tax Equalization Board, whose role is to equalize the tax rate in school districts that cross county lines and must deal with varying assessment calculations.

He said the 2023-24 figures show a $6.4 million drop in real estate evaluations for the district’s Armstrong County communities.

Meanwhile, the evaluations for Buffalo Township in Butler County climbed by $77 million from last year.

The end result is that Armstrong residents will go from shouldering 27.62% of the local real estate tax burden in 2022-23 to 24.95% in the new school year, according to Walker.

At the same, Buffalo Township residents will ante up 75.05% of the burden this year compared to 73.28% last year.

“It will not affect the current year’s millage or the 2023-24 operating budget,” Walker said. “It’s a shift in who’s paying the taxes.”

The increase in the Buffalo Township figures is understandable, he said, because of its continuing growth in development. However, Walker said some transactions in South Buffalo recorded by the state caught his attention and prompted the challenge.

“As far as Freeport Borough, their market values have decreased every year, with the exception of one over the past 10 years,” Walker said. “South Buffalo has steadily increased in value over the past 10 years.”