SARANAC LAKE — Fueled in part by spending associated with a voter-approved capital project, the proposed tax levy increase for Saranac Lake Central School District residents is bigger than in recent years, but it’s still within the state’s property tax cap.

The levy would rise 3.21 percent, from $20,268,144 to $20,918,779, under a proposed 2017-18 budget that was approved by the district’s Board of Education Wednesday. It will go before the voters May 16.

The last budget with a proposed levy increase above 3 percent was in 2013-14, when voters OKd a 3.64 percent increase. Since then, the levy increases each year have been 1.8, 2.4 and 0.30 percent, respectively.

Overall spending in 2017-18 would surpass $30 million for the first time in the district’s history. The district is proposing a $30,500,000 budget, up 2.52 percent over the current $29.8 million spending plan.

Superintendent Diane Fox said Friday that part of the tax levy increase is due to costs associated with an $18.7 million capital project approved in January by district voters. The project involves upgrades and renovations to each of the district’s school buildings.

“We tried to be up front throughout our capital campaign that there was going to be a bump,” Fox said. “The positive is that it’s not going to be gradual. There’s not going to be another bump the year after that and the year after that. We’re front-loading the cost of the project so over time it would smooth out.”

There are no significant cuts to personnel in the budget; in fact, it would add funding for several new positions. Two are tied to the purchase of new technology – laptop computers, iPads and Chromebooks — with a portion of the $796,558 the district was allocated from the $2 billion Smart Schools Bond Act, approved by New York voters in 2014.

Instead of using BOCES for two-days-a-week of technology support, Fox said the district plans to hire its own in-house, full-time computer technician. Funding has also been set aside in the proposed budget to hire a teacher-on-assignment to serve as a technology integration specialist.

“If we’re going to be bringing a lot of new equipment in and looking at ways to use that to supplement our instruction and provide rigor to our instruction, our teachers and our students are going to need support to do that,” Fox said.

Another new position is a dean of students for Petrova Elementary School. Fox said the position would help with data collection and paperwork that needs to be done at the school, along with behavior intervention and support work.

The district may also need to hire another elementary school teacher, depending on how enrollment numbers shake out, but that decision hasn’t been made yet, Fox said.

Overall school enrollment is projected to drop another 2 percent, from 1,188 students this year to a projected 1,163 next year. Ten years ago, the district’s enrollment was roughly 1,500 students.

“Our last large class, of 110 or more, is graduating this year,” Fox said. “Our incoming (kindergarten) so far is projected to be less than 80. In our other classes between kindergarten and grade 12, the class sizes are more consistent throughout the grades. They all run in the 90s, except for a couple of grades that are in the 80s. So, I do think this will smooth out a little bit, but we’ll have to see if the low number for this incoming kindergarten is just a blip, or if the downward trend continues.”

Fox said there are no significant new programs planned in next year’s budget, but the high school is planning to expand a distance learning program by offering classes in business law, marketing, computer science and entrepreneurship, among others.

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School board election

In addition to the budget, Saranac Lake school district voters will have two positions on the Board of Education to fill on May 16. The seats currently held by Kelly Morgan Dupree and Aurora White are up for a vote, according to district Clerk Christine Fransen. Each carries a three-year term.

So far, Fransen said, three people have picked up petitions: White, former village trustee and current Saranac Lake Winter Carnival Committee Chairman Jeff Branch, and Mike McCreadie, who ran unsuccessfully for a school board seat last year. Branch has returned his petitions.

Any other candidates interested in running can pick up petitions in either the Petrova Elementary School office or the district office at the high school Monday through Thursday of next week. Twenty-five signatures of qualified district residents are required in order to run. Petitions have to be filed with Fransen in the Petrova office by 4 p.m. April 17.