Neptune Township schools present revised budget after tentative state approval; may hold special meeting May 8

Neptune Township School District officials presented a revised 2025–26 budget to the Board of Education that relies on tentative Department of Education approval of the state's tax-levy incentive program to restore staff and services cut from an earlier draft.

In a presentation to the board, Business Administrator Rosemary Dela Sala said the district submitted an initial draft in March that included a 2% tax-levy increase, cuts of more than 40 positions and reductions to busing, professional development, field trips and mental-health supports. The revised budget incorporates potential tax-levy incentive funds and trims just 15 positions by attrition, she said.

The revised budget matters because the district has lost predictable state aid since 2018 and faces declining enrollment that has reduced its aid from about $32,000,000 annually before 2018 to roughly $8,000,000 now, Dela Sala said. With rising costs for health care and utilities, officials said the district had to weigh maintaining program breadth with fiscal responsibility.

Dela Sala said the district's overall budget has hovered around $90,000,000 for years. The proposed spending plan places salary and benefits as the largest driver, with total compensation-related costs quoted at $61,400,000. The presentation said Neptune currently lists 543 full-time staff in the budget. Other line items called out included approximately $5,500,000 for private special-education placements and roughly $4,000,000 for charter-school tuition.

The district showed a roughly 500-student drop in enrollment since 2018 and said that decline factors into the state funding formula. Dela Sala described the state program known in the presentation as "S2" (legislation passed in 2018) and explained that districts that fell below certain adequacy and local-share thresholds could increase the tax levy up to a calculated difference to capture incentive funds. She said the district had received tentative approval from the Department of Education and that final approval was pending.

If final approval is required to adopt the revised budget, district officials said they may convene a virtual special meeting on May 8 at 5:30 p.m. to finalize actions. Dela Sala directed questions about the 2025–26 budget to her office and said the full presentation would be posted on the district website.

Board members and administrators emphasized programs the district intends to preserve if funding permits, including pre-K–12 curricular offerings, visual and performing arts, athletics, Seal of Biliteracy, social-emotional learning, therapeutic psychologists and an early college program with Brookdale College that can yield an associate degree concurrent with high-school graduation.

The board did not take a final vote on the amended budget during the presentation; district officials described the change from the March draft to the revised version and noted the pending state action. The board scheduled public comment and indicated it would convene as needed to act on final Department of Education approval.