From the BCCT.
Taxes could increase an average $117
By JOAN HELLYER
The owner of Bensalem’s average assessed property could pay about $117 more in taxes in the coming school year to help cover an estimated $7 million revenue shortfall.
The district’s school board has to decide if it wants to raise taxes the maximum 4.1 percent allowed by the state to cover the projected deficit. Board members reviewed their options Wednesday night during a budget meeting.
Bensalem’s 2009-10 budget will top $114 million, said Jack Myers, the district’s director of business administration. However, projected revenues will total about $107 million, according to Myers.
He said the board could raise taxes about 5.35 mills to bring the district’s millage rate to roughly 135.75 mills. As per the state’s property tax law known as Act 1, that’s the maximum Bensalem could increase its millage rate without having to seek voter approval.
The additional mills would bring in about $3 million in new revenue, Myers said.
Additionally, the board could use about $3 million from the savings account, known as the fund balance to cover the shortfall, he said. Officials can look for ways to trim about $1 million from the projected budget.
The $114 million projected budget for next school year is about $4.5 million more than the 2008-09 financial plan.
The projected tax increase does not take into consideration a potential gambling rebate. The state has not said if it will give the rebate this year. It is based on how gambling establishments do across the state.
The board will decide Jan. 28 whether to declare that it will not exceed the district’s tax rate index, officials said. If that happens, the board would wait until May to adopt a preliminary budget. The final budget has to be adopted by June 30.
Thursday, January 15, 2009
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From yesterday's BCCT. Future home of Morrisville High? Our Father, ....
St. Michael pastor says school has room for more
By: Joan Hellyer
Bucks County Courier Times
The school can handle about 800 students but is operating at less than 50 percent capacity.
St. Michael the Archangel "stands ready to partner" with any local parish that needs help in providing students with a Catholic education, the pastor of the Tullytown church said on Tuesday.
The Rev. Michael DiIorio said his parish school is in no danger of closing or being consolidated with another area parish school. However, if other parishes within the Archdiocese of Philadelphia's Cluster 27 do decide to close, St. Michael has enough room to handle its students, he said.
"We have definitely put that offer out to everyone," DiIorio said.
Archdiocese officials have asked pastors within Cluster 27 to examine enrollment trends and gather parishioner feedback about their respective school's future. The request comes after parish and archdiocese officials reviewed 2000 Census data.
The data, posted on the archdiocese's Web site, suggests the population of people 18 years of age and younger in the cluster declined by about 3 percent since 1990.
In comparison, other areas in Bucks County are experiencing increases for the same age bracket. Those areas include the diocese's Cluster 26, which includes St. John the Evangelist and St. Ignatius of Antioch in Lower Makefield, Holy Trinity in Morrisville and St. Andrew in Newtown Township.
Advertisement Pastors within Cluster 27 are voluntarily looking at whether they should consolidate some of their operations by 2010-2011 to ease some of the strain school operations are putting on their parishes.
That plan could include churches such as Immaculate Conception in Bristol Township, St. Ann and St. Mark in Bristol, St. Joseph the Worker and St. Frances Cabrini in Falls and Queen of the Universe in Middletown.
St. Michael would be able to assist any parishes that will not be able to provide its students with a Catholic education, DiIorio said.
The school, which serves pre-kindergarten through eighth-grade students, has a capacity of about 800 students, the pastor said. It is less than 50 percent full, he said.
The parish is pursuing other revenue avenues to help cover the cost of its school operations, DiIorio said. He declined to say where the church would get the additional revenue.
But DiIorio did promise that St. Michael will "be a Catholic school presence for many years to come."
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