Plainfield Board of Education Adopts $336.8M Budget with No Tax Increase

PLAINFIELD, NJ — On Tuesday evening, the Plainfield Board of Education approved its budget for the 2026-27 school year. The final budget includes no tax increase, and affirms a reduction in force already approved at the April business meeting two weeks earlier.Acting Superintendent Elizabeth Filippatos and Business Administrator Cameron Cox presented the final budget, which echoed the tentative budget presentation in late March.Filippatos reiterated that the rightsizing plan will not affect class sizes, and that it is based on the district's shrinking K-12 enrollment, which is expected to decrease 4% in one year. Preschool enrollment is expected to dip 3.7%.“I just wanted to remind everybody what this budget represents,” said the Acting Superintendent. “It represents our commitment to keeping class sizes where they are—no increases—full access to materials and supplies, and continued coaching for new teachers. We're protecting our academic intervention services, our after-school services, and our mental health programs.”Filippatos reported that student services, counseling, social workers, special education, and nurses have been completely protected. The Acting Superintendent and Business Administrator presented a deck (link).Tuesday’s presentation again included inconsistent charter school enrollment figures that also appeared in the tentative budget presentation. One slide shows a 349-student charter school enrollment increase, another reflects a 143-student increase, and the third shows a decrease of 25 students. When asked following the tentative budget meeting, district leaders did not clarify this discrepancy. The district expects charter school payments to increase by $3.46 million.On Tuesday, Cox stated that the property tax levy will remain flat, resulting in $30,990,123 from Plainfield taxpayers, the same payment as the current fiscal year. During last year's budget process, the Plainfield BOE elected to raise the school tax levy by 18%, or $427 for the average Plainfield homeowner.The annual limit on school tax increases is 2%, but after years of lesser increases, taxes can be raised more through banked cap. A 2% increase for the coming school year would have raised the average Plainfield homeowner's taxes by around $50 and would have brought in $619,000 in revenue, according to the district.Cox explained that the BOE will pull $4 million from the capital reserve account and another $4 million from the budgeted fund balance for the upcoming school year. After the withdrawals, there will be $2.47 million remaining in the capital reserve fund and another $5.26 million in the budgeted fund.The district projects that salary and benefit payments will increase based on raises and rising healthcare costs, even though the district will have fewer employees. Cox said the rightsizing will save $9.54 million in salary and benefit costs, or 2.83% of the total operating budget of $336,779,479.Regarding whether central office administrators were reduced, Acting Superintendent Filippatos shared a slide showing that 18 reductions were made in the central office. The presentation did not specify whether these employees were moved or laid off. Cameron Cox later explained that many employees had what he called “bumping rights”. The district eliminated about 90 positions, and fewer than 60 employees were laid off.When asked by BOE President Hanae Wyatt to clarify the rightsizing, Filippatos summarized the process.“There are three reasons that you can reduce your force, and one of them is the requirement for all public schools to align their staff to their students,” said Filippatos. “We had a decrease in enrollment, which led to a decrease in the number of staff that were needed. We have committed publicly, on multiple presentations, to not reduce any services for our students in the classroom. There won't be any increase in class sizes, there won't be any reduction in materials. We have committed to keeping our student-facing interventions and supports at the current level that they are.”BOE Commissioner and Finance Chairman Victor Webb said that a potential tax increase wouldn't have made a large budgetary impact.“The fact that [taxes] haven't been raised continues to be a point that is made every year. In this case, this year, it would not have made a difference,” said Webb. “Some of the considerations were that we did not want to pass a tax increase on to the community that would not have made a significance in the total optic, I guess, this year. But we do understand the importance of possibly building back up our reserves. Every year, unfortunately, it just becomes a more difficult conversation, a thing to consider. Every year is different.”“We care about the members of this community, we care about the employees, and the staff. This impacts us deeply,” continued Webb. “It's not callous. It's not something that's just done without consideration.”Commissioner Eric Andrews said he did not believe the cuts would avoid affecting students or that a 2% tax increase was not worthwhile. Earlier in the month, Andrews voted against the rightsizing plan.“I appreciate what Commissioner Webb said about it,” said Andrews, who works as Principal of STEM Innovation Academy of the Oranges. “But I think what's being missed out is that taxes are accumulative. When we talk about raising at 2%, we're not talking about just one time, you're talking about 2% this year and next year. That $600,000 is still there.”“If we did not raise taxes last year, we would have a far more significant problem this year,” continued Andrews. “But the reason why it became a necessity to raise taxes last year is because, for seven years prior to that, the board made a decision not to raise taxes at all.”“I continue to struggle with the idea that we are all adults living with the fact that our food costs are going up, our electricity costs are going up, the cost of our health care individually is going up. And all that said and done, we're suggesting that we're not willing as a community to pay a marginal increase when it comes to educating children,” said Andrews. “It just doesn't sit right nor does it make sense to me.”"I don't at all believe [a tax increase] closes all the issues," said Andrews. “I fully recognize that we have a lower enrollment, so I respect the fact that there's going to be some cuts and adjustments that have to be made, but still struggle to understand, like some members of the public I heard say, how the cuts that were made—for instance, the decision to remove executive directors to reduce coaches in particular areas—is not going to affect services.”Andrews argued the importance of assistant principals, teachers' assistants, and coaches. He said he disagreed with merely keeping class sizes the same, arguing that smaller class sizes should be a goal for a district with a wide variety of students with various needs.After the board went into executive session, Commissioner Sincere Malone commented on the budget.“I appreciate the administration,” said Malone. “I think we did everything to really be fiscally responsible in this situation, but I just can't wrap up my head around right sizing without a tax increase.”Andrews and Malone voted against the budget, which passed 7-2.