Boyertown Area SD finance committee: forecasting shows near-balance if district adopts roughly 2% tax increase

Interim CFO Mister Lentz told the Boyertown Area School District finance committee in November that aligning next year’s revenue assumptions with recent actuals makes a nearly balanced 2026–27 budget feasible — but only with modest local tax action and continued conservative forecasting.

"If we adjust those revenues to be more aligned to the actuals, it drives more revenue into the budget," Lentz said, adding that "we come pretty close to a balanced budget at this point in time with a 2% tax increase." The presentation and board discussion highlighted three pressures: personnel and benefits, special-education tuition, and debt-service/transfers for capital projects.

Why it matters: the district faces uncertainty from an unresolved state budget and a court-ordered "adequacy" funding process that Lentz said left a local gap of about $13.3 million; Boyertown has received roughly $1.4 million to date, leaving about $11.8 million outstanding that cannot be relied on in the near-term forecast. Local revenues, chiefly earned-income and property taxes, now make up roughly three-quarters of the district’s revenue mix, Lentz said, and recent actual earned-income receipts — he used $10 million as an illustrative actual versus an $8.5 million budgeted figure — are a major reason the forecast looks stronger than the current adopted budget.

Lentz walked the committee through key assumptions that feed the projection: teacher salaries and contractual steps are built into personnel costs; health-insurance costs were estimated at a 10% increase based on trust meeting reports; transportation contracts are linked to the Act 1 index (Lentz used a 4.1% adjusted index for Boyertown); a 5% tuition-placement increase was applied where external placements are likely; and a $500,000 contingency reserve was included for unforeseen needs. He also included a $3,300,000 transfer to the capital reserve in the draft numbers.

On totals, Lentz presented a planning-level revenue figure near $156.8 million for the next budget and expenditures around $156.9 million; he said adjusting revenue assumptions to reflect recent actuals (including higher interest income and delinquent tax receipts) accounts for much of the favorable shift. For the current year, the district is projecting a positive year-end balance of about $4.3 million, though Lentz cautioned that state budget outcomes could change that result.

Board members asked for detail on an outlier year (2023) that showed much lower earned-income receipts and whether possible reassessments in Berks County could affect the tax base; Lentz said staff have asked the collector for disbursement data and that assessment protests and later settlements can affect revenues years later. He recommended not budgeting anticipated adequacy funding until the state provides a clear allocation method and timeline.

Public comment and transparency concerns: a public commenter from New Hanover Township praised the presentation but asked for more transparency about large transfers to capital reserves. "That's a lot of money to take out of operating expenses," the commenter said, noting prior transfers that, in his view, had not been clearly presented or approved. Lentz and the presiding officer responded by pointing to the draft budget’s explicit capital-transfer line and to staff plans to present refined, more transparent numbers after the holidays.

No formal votes were taken on tax-rate decisions or budget adoption at the meeting. The committee set a follow-up timeline: staff will return with a more refined budget after holiday-season updates and when more state information is available. The next finance committee meeting is scheduled for Feb. 10, 2026, at 6 p.m. in the district education center. The meeting adjourned without further action.

What’s next: staff will refine the forecast, clarify the capital-transfer line items and provide supporting documentation (collector disbursements, interest-income detail and the basis for the $10 million earned-income estimate) so the board can weigh whether to include a modest property-tax increase in the proposed budget.