Chartiers Valley School District property owners likely won’t pay more in taxes next year.

School directors voted, 6-3, on Tuesday, April 8 to approve the proposed final budget for next school year, which totals $79 million and maintains the real estate tax rate at 20.1909 mills.

The final budget is scheduled to be adopted at a 6:30 p.m. meeting on May 27.

Superintendent Daniel Castagna said that, last year, Chartiers Valley’s former finance director projected that the 2025-26 budget would have about a $7.1 million deficit. At that time, it was recommended the district use $3.4 million from its general fund balance and $550,000 in debt stabilization funds to fill the deficit, and would still be left with $3 million in deficit to address.

Since then, the district took measures such as approving program curtailments, staff adjustments and 30 teachers taking an early retirement incentive, to pull that deficit to roughly $542,ooo, which will be covered through the debt stabilization fund balance, Castagna said.

He said the district could improve its bond rating outlook if it can balance its budget without using reserves, which is what it is doing now.

Like most districts, salaries and benefits are the largest categories of the Chartiers Valley’s expenditures. About 75% of district revenues come from local funding sources, such as real estate taxes, and most of the remaining revenues are from the state. The proposal accounts for roughly $700,000 from the federal government.

“We are promised in local discussions that (federal) money will be reallocated to the states, and then allocated from the states into school districts,” Castagna said. “We should be OK, but there’s a lot of unknown and uncertainty there.”

Another issue Chartiers Valley — like many other school districts in Allegheny County — is dealing with is the decrease of the common level ratio, losing tax valuation coming into the district. The common level represents the ratio of assessed value as last determined by the state Tax Equalization Board.

Other budget revenues include increased costs for supplies and materials, and the district’s growing special education and English Language Learners population, Castagna said.

Board President Darren Mariano, Louise Huehn, Herb Ohliger, Ed Brosky, Jeff Choura and Kate Drury voted in favor of the proposed budget; Mitch Montani, Lisa Trainor and Megan Sexton were opposed.

Resident Sam Folmer, of Scott, expressed her opinion on the district’s future plans.

“Balancing a budget by eliminating people and opportunities for students is not a financial strategy, it’s damage control, not sustainability,” Folmer said. “The budget only balances because you cut until it did — not because new revenue came in, not because costs were restructured and certainly not because student needs decreased as you showed tonight, because they haven’t.”

She questioned recent district expenditures, such as consulting agreements, and feared students would pay the price with the proposed budget.

“This approach, cut until the numbers work, isn’t strategic,” she said. “It’s not a plan, it’s just subtraction. I’m asking for more than a spreadsheet that adds up, I’m asking for transparency, for long-term thinking, and for leadership that puts the educational experience for students, not just numbers, at the center of every decision.”

Transportation

Chartiers Valley pays nearly twice as much in transportation costs per student per year — roughly $1,233 — than similar-sized school districts like Moon Area, West Jefferson Hills and Plum, Castagna said.

He said Chartiers Valley, with 3,518 students, gets 18.3% of transportation costs reimbursed through the state’s transportation subsidy. The formula includes factors such as passenger capacity, aid ratio, cost index, and age and mileage of vehicles.

“The goal is to get as much back from the state in subsidy,” he said. “In layman’s terms, the state wants to help you pay for transportation, but they put perimeters on it so they’re not just writing a blank check to you.”

Compared to 43 county school districts, Chartiers Valley is the 36th lowest in subsidy coverage. Forty county districts have the same transportation model as Chartiers Valley — Steel Valley, Brentwood and Mount Lebanon do not bus in-house students.

Chartiers Valley ranks the fourth-highest in transportation costs per student in Allegheny County. The district’s total budgeted transportation cost for next year is $5.14 million, before it receives any subsidy.

Castagna compared costs between Chartiers Valley, Plum, Moon and West Jefferson Hills with data from the 2022-23 school year, the most recent publicly available data.

Plum, at 3,653 students, operates its own in-house transportation model, and its total transportation expense was $3.7 million. Thirty-five percent was covered by subsidy.

West Jefferson Hills, at 3,379 students, had a transportation budget of $3.18 million with 31% covered by subsidy. Moon, with 4,136 students, had a $3.35 million budget with 31% covered by subsidy.

“You can see how much more they have, being covered by subsidies, proving they are running way more efficiently than we are,” Castagna said.

“That’s a number we have to change.”

How did the district get here?

The district has declined academically over the past decade, Castagna said. It is now ranked 52nd among Western Pennsylvania school districts in Pittsburgh Business Times rankings.

“The best way I can explain the core academic decline in the last 10 years was that we did not adopt a philosophy of standards-based instruction,” Castagna said.

He pointed to the state’s data-driven, growth-based Value-Added Assessment System “PVAAS” when looking at district academics. His goal is to have district scores be in the “well above” or “above” significant growth categories. That would indicate that a school or group of students has demonstrated moderate evidence of exceeding the growth standard.

“It’s a way to show that you’re instructing students and you’re guiding and meeting their needs, even if they’re not passing the PSSA exam,” he said. “So as educators, we like these; as administrators, we like them, because we get to drill down to the classroom and student level and see what instruction was happening and the progress during that time.”

Scores indicate that students are doing better in English than math, which is why the district is proposing blocks or double-periods for sixth, seventh and eighth grade math classes, Castagna said. Chartiers Valley’s average growth index for Math PSSA scores since 2018 decreased 4.7%.

On the PSSA, the district moved from 57.2% of students being proficient or advanced to 53.4%.

The worst data, Castagna said, shows that the district’s average Keystone score for algebra moved from passing to not only failing, but to a level that it would not meet the composite score graduation requirement.

“We can’t watch this and not do anything about it,” he said. “We have to change that.”

Castagna said the future includes a focus on core academics and preserving academic and extracurricular activities.

“Today, in my professional opinion, this is your next step,” he said. “Approve this budget, change this district and let’s start making progress forward.”

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