Next School Tax Hike Will be 2.1% or Less, Administrator Says

Parkland School District’s director of business administration is ready to guarantee that school real estate taxes will not have to go up more than 2.1 percent in 2014.

On Tuesday night, John Vignone recommended to the school board that it opt out of the accelerated budget adoption process called for under Pennsylvania Act 1 in 2014.

If the board follows that recommendation—made during a budget workshop session—the district would be locked into a budget that raises taxes no more than the Pennsylvania Department of Education index.

For Parkland schools, that number is 2.1 percent or .29 mills. This would be the first time in at least three years that Parkland has not sought preliminary approval to go beyond the indexed tax hike.

A tax increase of .29 mills would raise the school real estate tax on a home assessed at $200,000 by $58 a year. The same tax increase would bring an additional $2.1 million in revenue to the district.

Vignone told the board that there are some budget uncertainties that concern him, including the level of state and federal funding for education and an upcoming contract negotiation with the teachers union. The current two-year deal expires in August.

But there are also positive trends on the revenue side, he said. Those include increased earned income tax revenues and a district-wide increase in the value of real estate, which is translating into a higher amount of dollars per mill of tax.

“We’re living within the index,” Vignone told school directors.

To raise tax beyond the state index, school districts are required to either ask the voters in a referendum or apply to the state for exceptions, which can only be for special education expenditures, retirement plan expenditures or approved long-term construction debt.

School districts have until Jan. 30 to decide whether they will opt out of the accelerated budget process.