VOORHEESVILLE — If the governor’s proposal on reconfiguring BOCES aid goes through, Voorheesville, which is considered a wealthy district, could lose nearly half its aid.
"The wealthier you are, the lower the aid," Assistant Superintendent for Business Sarita Winchell told the school board Monday night as she went through detailed lists of current and projected expenditures for Board of Cooperative Educational Services.

Districts — particularly small ones — are often attracted to BOCES programs and services because, with the state aid, the costs are less than developing their own programs or hiring their own staff.

The governor’s proposal calls for an overall reduction of $31 million in BOCES aid.

This year, Voorheesville, a small suburban district, got $491,199 in aid for BOCES programs it uses. Its aid factor is now .659, meaning it should get about 66 percent back in aid for services it uses from BOCES.
"We actually get about 54 or 55 percent back," Winchell told The Enterprise on Tuesday. That’s because, she said, "Certain things are excluded." She gave as an example a cap of $30,000 on teachers’ salaries; while most BOCES teachers earn more than that, aid comes back on only $30,000.

The governor has proposed changing the ratio, based on a district’s wealth, so Voorheesville would get just 37 percent back in aid; the floor is 35 percent.
If that formula were adopted, the actual aid to Voorheesville would probably be "in the 20s," said Winchell, again because of excluded items.

If the state plan goes through, she predicted a loss of $235,965 in aid for Voorheesville.

The district’s single biggest BOCES cost is for special education, which totals $501,000 this year. Special education is aided under a different formula, Winchell said. Other major costs are for Vo-Tec and alternative education, and for computer hardware.

Winchell projected an increase of $137,009 in the BOCES budget for next year, bringing it up to $1.49 million.
"We’re going to have to look very, very carefully at every expense for BOCES," said board President David Gibson, to see if it can be reduced or if the district can do it in-house.
"We’re going to have to re-evaluate what we get from BOCES," he concluded.
Regarding her long list of BOCES expenditures, Winchell said, "I’m willing to roll up my sleeves and look at every single one of them."

This year’s Voorheesville budget totals $21 million, for which New Scotland residents are taxed at a rate of $16.85 per $1,000 of assessed property value. The school board is slated to adopt the 2008-09 budget on April 7 and the public has its say in May.

Winchell had been optimistic about next year’s budget until she found out about the proposal to reformulate BOCES aid. While debt service is going up $226,000, that will be covered by more money in building aid for the current renovation project, Winchell told The Enterprise.
"The timing was perfect," she said of the bond issue. "Here I think I’m setting up a great year and you get the rug pulled out from under you."
She said on Tuesday of drafting a budget with state revenues undecided, "It’s very difficult because your revenues are uncertain." If the aid goes down, she said, "It’s like a huge increase in costs."
Winchell concluded, "We’ll have alternatives. There are a couple of things we can do — none of them are pleasant."