Board seeks cuts; Belcastro is retiring

“Do the cuts that you can make right now. The longer we wait the deeper the hole.”

— Angela Lind, Wrenshall business manager

Superintendent Kim Belcastro announced her resignation during a special meeting of the Wrenshall school board Dec. 8. The meeting also served to announce early rounds of $300,000 worth of budget cuts, including the immediate losses of one full-time paraprofessional and a retiring math teacher.

“I made the decision I am leaving,” Belcastro announced after 15 years in the district. “I can leave as early as Jan. 5, or I’m willing to stay for the remainder of the school year if the new board is interested in having me stay on in some capacity to help with the transition when a new person gets hired.”

The new board will take over in January and decide how to proceed with Belcastro’s offer to remain through the school year.

Board electees Mary Carlson and Eric Ankrum were in attendance at the special meeting, which outlined $35,500 in cuts already made along with a series of further reductions, including six possible non-tenured teacher position cuts that would come at the end of the school year.

“We haven’t been in cut mode in a long time in this district, and it’s quite an adjustment,” Belcastro said.

Administration issued worksheets outlining prospective cuts and also showed roughly $33,700 due to Belcastro upon retirement for unused sick days and vacation time.

“So, the cuts we’re looking at making … are actually going to go to paying your retirement payout,” said outgoing board appointee Cindy Bourn. “Which is yours, it’s in your retirement contract.”

Belcastro ignored the comment. Bourn and other outgoing members, Jack Eudy and Deb Washenesky, called for the superintendent’s resignation in the recent past.

“Our sole reason for making cuts is because of our enrollment being lower than what we had based on our academic programming,” Belcastro said. “That’s why we’re going through this process.”

The school’s financial situation isn’t as dire as originally projected, said business manager Angela Lind, who recommended $300,000 in cuts as an adjustment down from $321,000 first announced in November.

“Do the cuts that you can make right now,” Lind said. “The longer we wait the deeper the hole we’re getting in.”

An audit shows revenues falling roughly $106,000 short of expenses this year. Still, the district is on track to be out of money to pay debt service at the end of January. To cover, the board approved borrowing $500,000 in addition to making cuts that will adjust for an enrollment (347) that is currently 10 students below original budget projections.

“You not only need to cover the deficit, but you need to pay back what we’re borrowing and we also need to build the balance — we want to get some padding there,” Lind said. “So, you’ve got to make cuts that are more than just covering the deficit.”

Board appointee Ben Johnson, who was also elected to a seat come January, said he was “scared” to see the district’s fund balance fall below $500,000.

“In my term, I want to see this district back on solid financial footing,” Johnson said, asking what a target would be for a budget reserve.

Lind responded that policy was 8-10 percent of operating costs, roughly $550,000-plus or two months of operating costs, on a $5.47 million budget for 2023-24.

With one paraprofessional, valued at $14,300, already informed they’d not be needed after the holiday break, board members wondered why other “paras” couldn’t be cut. But many of those are assigned to students with special needs.

“We can’t cut paras that are attached to students by law through their (individual education programs),” Belcastro said, explaining limitations to cuts, which also included teacher contracts that carry individuals in the union through the end of the year.

A host of teacher position options were presented for cuts at the end of the year. They’re not tenured, meaning posts held by people who have not reached their fourth year in the school. Those possibilities included an elementary guidance counselor, a media center/business education teacher, one special education teacher, a part-time science position and a pair of elementary teachers.

Not all of those positions will need to be lost, the administration said.

“We’re showing options and really wanting the board to understand we’re looking at all the options,” Belcastro said.

Near the end of the hour-and-a-half-long special meeting, board members bandied about ideas such as using a part-time superintendent or principal.

Outgoing board members also warned incoming board members that the school has a 50-member junior class that’s twice as large as most classes and targeted to graduate in 2024. Losing such a high number of students has the potential to send the district spiraling deeper into crisis, members mused.

“One day at a time,” board chair Misty Bergman said.