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We Do Get a Say

In the latest Guilford Events magazine that arrived by mail in “The First Selectman’s Corner,” I was encouraged by our first selectman to attend meetings and offer my input on the town budgets being presented. So, I have started attending. My first meeting was the Board of Finance meeting on Feb. 15. The Board of Education presented its proposed budget for 2024-’25.

From this presentation, I noticed that our total enrollment for students from the 2016 school year to the 2024-’25 school year has steadily declined from 3,389 to 3,076 students. This is a decrease of 9.2%. On the same theme, the school budget per student for the same time period has increased from $17,087 per student in 2016 to the proposed budget of $23,458 per student for 2024. This is a 37.3% increase. If you take an inflation average of 3.5% per year, the budget should only have increased by 28% for this same period. So, the school budget proposal should be $21,871 per student and, in other numbers, a total of $67,275,196 instead of $72,157,151.

The economy has not been easy these last several years since the pandemic. I notice there is shrinkflation; for example, sports drinks have reduced from 32 to 28 ounces per bottle, but the price is the same. Now our electricity is going up by 19%/month. We do not get much say in these changes or increases, but we do get a say in the town budgets.

Chris Breton

Guilford