By Renee Worthing
Staff Writer
 

    Voters repeatedly raised pink cards above their heads, signaling approval for all 12 articles of the proposed $29.8 million Maine School Administrative District 71 budget.
  Kennebunk and Kennebunkport voters turned out May 15 at Kennebunk High School for the MSAD 71 budget meeting, the first of the new two-step budget approval process required by the school consolidation law.
  Articles 1 through 6 asked voters to authorize spending $29.8 million for pre-kindergarten to grade 12 instruction, instructional support, leadership, operations, transportation and “other commitments.”
  Because the state and each local school administrative unit are jointly responsible for contributing to the cost of Essential Programs and Services (EPS), Article 7 asked voters if the district should appropriate $22.8 million for the total cost of funding public education and if the district should raise and assess the amounts of $17.6 million from Kennebunk and $4.6 million from Kennebunkport as each towns contribution for the total cost of funding public education.
  Article 8 asked voters if the district should raise and appropriate $599,000 for annual debt payments and service approved by district voters for non-state funded school capital projects.
  Article 9 required a “yes” or “no” ballot vote. The question, “Shall the district raise and appropriate $5,099,014 in additional local funds, which exceeds the states Essential Programs and Services allocation model by $4,604,529 as required to fund the budget recommended by the Board of Directors?” was answered affirmatively by 226 voters, while 30 ballots were counted as “no” and one ballot was blank.
  According to documentation provided to voters, the MSAD71 Board of Directors recommends the $5 million for additional local funds, which is about $4.6 million more than the states essential programs and services funding model.
   Roughly $23,000 represents local costs for the food services program and about $44,500 represents local costs to support the district school programs that are not included in the state’s funding model including costs for special education programming, transportation, co-curricular and extra curricular programs and teacher salaries.
  Article 10 asked voters to authorize the entire budget of $29.8 million, while Article 11 sought authorization to transfer up to 25 percent from undesignated fund balances left over from the 2007-2008 fiscal year to establish a capital reserve fund.
  Article 12 asked voters to approve just under $50,000 for the district’s portion of the adult education budget.
  School Board Member Jeff Sharood said non-essential administrative and teaching staff was eliminated in order to keep the budget below a 3 percent increase from last year. This year’s budget is 2.83 percent higher than last year’s $29 million budget.
   “We were able to keep expenditures below 3 percent with the natural maturity of debts,” Sharood said.
  The town will move on to the second phase of the school budget approval process May 20 when registered voters will vote by binding referendum on one question – “Shall the 2008-2009 school budget adopted at the district budget meeting on May 15, 2008 be approved?”
  If voters approve the budget, it will become MSAD71’s fiscal year budget beginning July 1. However, if the referendum does not pass, the board of school directors will return to the tables to tweak the budget and the process will begin again.