Friday, May 8, 2020
Vol. 96, No.40
FOUNDED 1923
n
n
LOCALLY OWNED AND EDITED
Sanitation heroes PAGE 20 n Learn Legos PAGE 24
Absentee ballot voting planned for June 9 school budget vote
MESSAGES OF HOPE
BY RIKKI MASSAND
A rock garden with messages of hope was created near Homestead School. The stones are painted with messages such as “This too shall pass” and “We miss you Homestead!”. Thank you to the unknown artist(s) who created it.
Motor Parkway parking proposal costs increase, historians critical of plan BY RIKKI MASSAND
The Village Board of Trustees was set to vote on a bid for constructing a new parking area for access to Stewart Field athletic grounds in the far eastern stretch of the village at its Thursday evening, May 7 meeting. The agenda item called for Board
approval of an increase to the budget for the Stewart Field project from $200,000 to $388,000, as well as a transfer of $188,000 to Capital Projects from the village Contingent account, for additional funding needed to cover bid award. The village’s low bidder as of the meeting and proposed to
receive the contract of $388,000 is Coastal Contracting, Corp. of Huntington Station. The parking would go atop the strip of the historic Long Island Motor Parkway -- the first roadway in America built exclusively for automobile use in the early 1900s and part of See page 29
At its virtual meeting held Tuesday night, May 5, the Garden City Board of Education adopted the proposed schools’ budget with a revised calendar for voting. The vote will now take place -- by absentee ballot only -- on Tuesday, June 9. The annual budget vote was originally scheduled for Tuesday, May 19, and was moved back due to COVID19 closures and social distancing practices. A budget hearing is planned for Wednesday night, May 27 as the hearing needs to take place between 7 and 10 days before the official community vote on the budget and district election. The 2020-’21 district budget as adopted by the school board Tuesday night is $120,913,141, meeting the maximum allowable New York State property tax levy of 1.74%, as that is the district’s projected tax levy increase with STAR. As the board discussed at its April 21 meeting, the increase for budget year 2019-’20 to next school year would be 2.47% -- $2.913 million. Months earlier the projected increase was 2.24% but the amount went higher based on projections for less state aid and less interest earnings for the district due to the financial markets. In her presentation for the proposed budget May 5, Superintendent of Schools Dr. Kusum Sinha said the situation with State Aid remains unclear, as school districts are calculating and preparing for cuts between 10% and 20% of what was originally projected for academic year 20202-21, as the potential of mid-year cuts from New York State looms. The State will review its budget by July and again on December 31, and any unplanned cuts would have implications for district finance plans as the first months of 2021 unfold. “The revisions (in April) ensure that the needs of our students would be met and that we’d be fiscally responsible due to these uncertainties. We’ve planned to appropriate reserves of $500,000 to cover a one-time anticipated expense in student support related to special education and compensatory services, related to schools’ closure,” Dr. Sinha said. Last year, of the district’s $117.99 million budget, $102.76 million was to be raised from property taxes including STAR. This year, of the $120.91 million, $104.54 million would be raised through the property tax levy. On the expense side of the $120.91 million district budget, almost $91 million (75.15%) would be allocated towards program components and See page 32
Memorial Day parade canceled; Vets Day plans PAGE 3 TMA Booster Club helps GCHS seniors celebrate PAGE 39