An additional $867,000 in budget cuts was proposed last night by Mamaroneck UFSD Superintendent Dr. Paul Fried in the third and final "Budget Reduction Initiatives" meeting before presenting his recommendations to the school board and the community on March 16.

With these reductions, plus an additional $600,000 taken from areas such as the workers' compensation and unemployment reserves and "additional fund balance," a total of nearly $9 million in cuts have been proposed for the 2010 - 2011 school budget in the past month. In this latest version, property tax rates would increase about 4.45 percent, down substantially from the 5.82 percent proposed at the last meeting.

Calling the process of culling the budget for areas to cut "very, very difficult work," Fried added that the current economic climate, which has produced deep funding cuts from Albany and a severe dip in local tax revenues, "the darkest hour we've seen in our lifetimes."

The audience of about 130 in Mamaroneck High School's Tiered Classroom was smaller and the mood more sober than at the previous meeting, which had to be moved to a larger space to accommodate a crowd of several hundred. 

Superintendent Fried's efforts to heed community input on such hot-button items as maintaining the current Kindergarten schedule, preserving class sizes -- which grew this year -- reducing proposed cuts to the musicals at the middle and high schools and safeguarding athletics became quickly apparent.

In addition, no further instructional staffing cuts were recommended at this meeting, keeping that number at 57.4. Instead, Fried proposed additional cuts to clerical, maintenance and technical staff, as well as partial funding reductions in a range of extracurricular activities, includingthe Semi-Royal Shakespeare Company and Performing Arts Curriculum Experience (PACE) shows ($4,000 and $13,000 cuts, respectively). Two of the largest new cuts were $400,000 in capital spending and $500,000 in additional fund balance.

The lack of participation by teachers in the budget reduction process, an absence one parent called "a void," was by far the most contentious issue discussed last night. School administrators reminded the audience that the three working meetings held over the past month are unprecedented, and that the teachers' union has, in the past, responded after the Superintendent's official presentation of the budget.

Last year, for instance, the union offered concessions in the form of increased health insurance contributions that saved 2.2 teaching positions. Still, one parent noted, teacher input earlier on could have been a key factor in making the best possible choices in proposing cuts.

Assistant Superintendent for Business Operations Meryl Rubinstein explained that the budget presented on March 16 can be amended through April 20, at which date it must be adopted by the school board. If the teacher's union were to make concessions, additional funding from Albany secured or new areas for reductions identified, changes could be made through that mid-April date.

Fried and Tse explained that the district negotiated a generous contract with its teachers' union prior to the economic crisis, which is why employee raises of about 6 percent on average may be larger than those of teachers in neighboring communities. The contract between the district and the teachers' union will terminate in June of 2011.

In general, audience members seemed largely resigned to accepting the new cuts, which were disbursed across a wide array of school levels, departments, operational and extracurricular areas.

"The Superintendent has worked really hard to meet the board's requirement to bring the tax rate way down," said Jennifer Malherbe, co-chair of the Parent Teacher Association at Central School. "It's time for the community to find a way to get that passed and not cut further into our children's programs."

If local residents vote against the budget twice, a contingency budget will take effect, requiring further cuts of some $2.2 million dollars and potentially 22 staff members, cautioned Fried. This would "totally devastate our programs," said board of education president Linnet Tse.

The nearly $9 million in reductions is being compared to a baseline "rollover budget," or theoretical budget, that includes no reductions from that of the current school year. But such a budget would require a 9 percent increase, 76 percent of which comes from employee salaries and benefits.

The budget will be voted on by the community on May 18. For further information on the budget, see the district's Web site.