The Hicksville School District carried out what Assistant Superintendent of Business Marcy Tannenbaum said “balances the 2025-26 budget without program cuts while being sensitive to the district’s taxpayers.“
The district’s Board of Education adopted a $180.8 million budget for the 2025-26 school year, a 4.38% increase from the current year, that will be voted on by the community on Tuesday, May 20. But the district needed to do some work to ensure it had a balanced budget.
In March, the district said it was facing a deficit of $6.9 million.
Tannenbaum said the district looked at class size and a decrease in enrollment to make appropriate changes to the budget. The district was able to offer a retirement incentive, which will reduce staffing costs as well. The district also rolled $1.4 million in capital reserve money onto the revenue side.
The second proposition that community members will vote on in May would allow the district to put $1.27 million into a Capital Reserve for Technology at no cost to taxpayers to fund projects that would otherwise be in the budget.
All of these measures chipped the district’s deficit down to $1.7 million.
Tannenbaum said the district decided to pierce the cap and use $2.64 million from its Reserve for Debt Service to lower the tax cap to 1.07%. She said the district had roughly $3.8 million in its reserve for this, and the funding came from leftover bond proceeds and interest earnings on bonds. Tannenbaum said the remaining $1.2 million may be applied to next year’s school budget.
The district then set its tax levy at 2.54%, which is lower than the 3.35% tax levy that the district would have used if it did not pierce the cap.
Tannenbaum said this decision saves taxpayers money, which a budget presentation from the district suggests would be around $45 per household in savings.
The piercing of the tax cap means the district will need 60% voter approval to pass this iteration of the budget.
If the approved budget does not reach that mark, the district said there would be a revote in which it would not pierce the tax cap, and would have a tax levy increase of 3.35%. That proposal would only need 50% voter approval to pass.
The district said it would have to cut an additional $1.7 million from the budget, which would affect athletic programs, clubs, field trips, facility usage, fine arts, AP classes, the elimination of the third-grade music program and funding for the Hicksville Gregory Museum.
But why did the district need to make these financial decisions in the first place?
Tannenbaum said that increasing costs across the board have made it difficult for the district to operate. She highlighted the costs of health insurance, retirement systems, utilities, business with vendors, supplies and materials as drivers for the $7.6 million expense increase.
“It gets to a point where it’s simply not sustainable,” Tannenbaum said. “We have contractual increases with our units. We’re running a big business here. You can’t sustain rising costs when you have a consumer price index at 3% and we’re constricted [to a two percent increase.]”
“While the proposed budget reflects a unique planning approach, it allows us to maximize revenue, preserve all essential programs and services for our students, and minimize the tax impact on residents,” Hicksville Superintendent Ted Fulton said in a statement following the budget adoption.
All three candidates running for the district’s Board of Education, Annette Beiner, Linda Imbriale and Faisal Mirza, were also in favor of the district’s financial decision.
The budget vote and trustee election will be held on Tuesday, May 20, with polls open from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. at Burns Avenue School, East Street School, Woodland School, Lee Avenue School, Fork Lane School, Dutch Lane School, and Old Country Road School.
