Article 9:
Souhegan Tuition Reserve Account ($200,000)
Warrant Article Language
Shall the Souhegan Cooperative School District establish a Student Tuition Expendable Trust Fund per RSA 198:20-c, V for the purpose of paying student tuition as required by RSA 194-D, Open Enrollment School Program, and to raise and appropriate the sum of two hundred thousand dollars ($200,000) to be placed in this fund, and further, to name the Souhegan Cooperative School Board as agents to expend from said fund. This sum is to be raised from new taxation. Majority vote required.
Article 9 shall only take effect if Article 8 fails, and shall be null and void if Article 8 passes.
Recommended by the Souhegan Cooperative School Board (6-1)
Recommended by the Souhegan Cooperative School District Advisory Finance Committee (7-0)
Estimated tax impact of passing this article is $0.07 per thousand for Amherst and $0.05 per thousand for Mont Vernon.
BOARD EXPLANATION
This is a trailer article to the Open Enrollment Article. If the Open Enrollment Article does not pass, then this article asks to raise $200,000 from new taxes in order to put it in a reserve account to pay tuition if any students choose to go to another school through the Open Enrollment Program. If the Open Enrollment article does pass, then this article will not raise any money as it will not be needed.
If the Open Enrollment article does not pass and we are not able to set a percentage of students who can leave the school, then the tax payers are at risk of paying 80% of Souhegan cost per pupil to another school district. One student leaving does not equate to removing one teacher or reduction in most costs. Remember that Cost per pupil is an average of total costs divided by the number of students. If you reduce your number of students and don’t reduce costs enough, then the cost pupil actually goes up.
This reserve account would allow us to pay the tuition without harm to the regular education budget.
SOUHEGAN ADVISORY FINANCE COMMITTEE COMMENTS
The vote of the SAFC on Article 8 was 6 in favor to 1 opposed. The issue around being designated as an Open Enrollment School is complicated and will require the Board to communicate clearly to the public why a yes vote is needed to protect Souhegan’s ability to manage the number of students going out and coming in and the financial implications that result. Our greatest concern is that the voters will not understand the need to vote yes because they won’t fully understand why this is being put forth.
The companion Article 9 was actually suggested by the SAFC to make sure there were funds available outside the budget to cover unanticipated tuition obligations to other schools that would occur should Article 8 fail. The vote on Article 9 was 7 to 0 in favor.
VOICE OF THE VOTER
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