The Bermudian Springs school board added a new member during a special meeting on Feb. 10.
The board voted 7-0 to add Dianna Canapp as a board member for Region II. Canapp’s term will end later this year. Board member Matthew Nelson abstained from voting.
Canapp is filling the vacancy left by Travis Mathna, who resigned.
Canapp was hired after the board conducted one-on-one interviews with candidates for the position, with Superintendent Brad Sterner reading the same list of questions to each candidate.
Of the candidates, Canapp was the only one to be nominated. After being approved, Canapp was immediately sworn in.
The board also filled the spot on the Adams County Technical Institute (ACTI) board left vacant following Mathna’s resignation. The board approved board vice-president Brian Davis as the primary representative and board member Neil Tate as the alternate member.
2025-26 budget
Justin Peart, business manager for the district, gave the board a regular update on the development of the 2025-26 school year budget.
This year, the district can approve a tax increase up to the Act One Index of 5.4% (or 0.7182 mills). It could also approve no tax increase, or anywhere in between.
Other options Peart presented include a 3.5% increase (0.4788 mills) and a 1.8% increase (0.2394 mills.)
Approving a budget with no tax increase would result in the loss of potential revenue of $797,361, according to Peart.
While Peart will continue to fine-tune the budget as he gains more detailed information, he did provide a breakdown of what the board could expect.
As exact amounts from the state and federal governments are not yet available, Peart created the budget assuming the district received the same amounts from them as it did in the current fiscal year.
The budget includes $21,531,339 of local revenue, $14,787,697 of state revenue, and $440,057 of federal revenue.
Peart predicted that earned income tax, the second-highest source of local revenue, will continue to rise 4.05% over this year’s amount.
Peart provided information on what education-related items were included in Gov. Josh Shapiro’s proposed state budget, tempering expectations by noting that, especially with control of the state government split among Democrats and Republicans, Shapiro is unlikely to get his full ‘wish list’ included in the proposed budget.
If enacted as is, the proposed state budget would include increases for basic education ($61,129 increase), special education ($25,731 increase), and the Ready to Learn Block Grant ($362,800 increase) for the district.
In all, the district would gain $449,660 should all of Shapiro’s education proposals that directly affect Bermudian Springs be approved.
“You all know that’s not going to happen,” Peart said – which is why, with the actual figures still unknown, Peart is using the FY 2024-25 state figures as placeholders.
About 1.34% of the budget ($440,057) is from federal revenue.
While the board ponders whether to increase taxes, Peart said the district will see expenses rise about 6.38% due to higher costs for speech services, therapy services, legal services, ACTI tuition, technological upgrades and other needs.
Peart said the special education costs have risen in part due to higher need among the district. Because families may move in or out of the district and student needs can vary, Peart said budgeting can be difficult as it is a “moving target.”
Peart also told the board it will need to continue to set aside money for the ACTI building. As the project is ongoing and ACTI has not yet committed to renovating an existing building or opting for a new build, the budget is still unknown.
Based upon the latest ACTI update, Peart said the ACTI building cost will probably be $60-80 million, with Bermudian Springs responsible for $100,000 per million. That means the district’s portion will likely be in the range of $600,000 to $800,000.
That said, Peart said he does not foresee the district needing to pay for the project immediately.
“Call me crazy, but I don’t foresee a debt service payment coming in this school year, because even if they do borrow the money, it’s not going to be due right away this fiscal year,” Peart said. “If it is, that’s the fastest-moving debt service that I’ve seen.”
This would allow the district more time to set money aside for the build.
Looking ahead, Peart provided three years of fund balance projections. If the current 2025-26 budget shortfall of over $1.8 million continues, the district will have to make up the difference using its fund balance. That would take the district’s fund balance from $6,396,773 to $4,555,805 by the end of FY 2025-26.
Should that trend continue, the district would be left with a scant $1.5 million fund balance at the end of FY 2026-27.
While predictions get fuzzier the further out they are, current fund balance projections show the district with a fund balance of -$2.7 million by the end of FY 2027-28, worsening to -$8.5 million by the end of FY 2028-29.
“I know when you get out to year two (FY 2027-28) and three (FY 2028-29) it gets ugly,” Peart said. “Again, this isn’t gloom and doom by any stretch, but this is information I have at my fingertips right now as we work through the entire process. Will I say, do I feel as good as I did last year when I saw the governor’s budget, because we got a pretty good amount of money that came from the state? I don’t feel we’re going to get that this year, because we can’t expect that significant increase year after year after year.”
Projecting further than a year or two in advance is difficult, particularly without any way of knowing what state or federal money to anticipate.
“We have to make good choices, and we have, and stay financially sound as we move forward, because at some point the state is not going to be able to bail us out and give us more money than we were anticipating,” Peart said.
While the federal revenue is a small percentage of its budget, it is still more than $400,000 to consider.
“There’s a lot of uncertainty at the federal level right now, so we’ll see how that all plays out,” Peart said.
Each month, Peart will present the most up-to-date information he has for the board to consider. It will vote on a preliminary budget in May and a final budget in June.
Sterner praised Peart and the rest of the business office for their ongoing work.
“There’s not a day that goes by that we aren’t talking about the budget, every day, multiple times a day, about different pieces of it,” Sterner said. “I do appreciate everything that your team is doing and I do appreciate the research that you put into it. It’s not just what you’re doing here. His team does a great job at seeing what everybody else is doing around here, so it’s not just here, and how it could impact us and the way we operate.”
Other business
The board also approved the 2025-26 high school course guide.
Two new courses (floral design and journalism) were added to the guide for board approval, according to Dr. Shannon Myers, the assistant superintendent.
While the courses are still in development and administration is not yet sure if there will be enough participation, Myers said they were added to the guide to allow the school to offer the courses should they work out.
The board also approved the 2025-26 district calendar.
The board will hold a caucus meeting at 7 p.m. Monday, March 10. The next regular meeting is scheduled for 7 p.m. Tuesday, March 11.
Imari Scarbrough is a freelance journalist. She was a staff newspaper reporter for five years before becoming a freelancer in 2017. She has written on crime, environmental issues, severe weather events, local and regional government and more.
You can visit her website at ImariJournal.com.