The Charles County Board of Education approved its Fiscal Year 2015 budget June 23, but it came at a cost. With less from county government to work with, some programs will have to be cut, Superintendent for Finance Paul Balise told the BOE.

Incorporating funding approved by the Charles County Commissioners two weeks ago, Balise said staff had met several times over the past week in order to balance the budget.

“It’s important to notice this budget does contain the largest cut for salaries resulting in employees being two grade steps behind. This is the sixth year in a row for no COLAS for BOE staff,” Balise said.

The $2.9 million approved by the county includes $652,000 for mandatory retirement costs, and he added that the Fund Balance Transfer Fund of $3.2 million remains unchanged as does the $7.7 million mandatory cost for opening the new St. Charles High School.

Facing a deficit of $5.4 million, Balise said cuts would be necessary to balance the budget, but difficult nonetheless.

“Things could come out without having a huge impact in terms of the bottom line,” he stated. One area he found some savings was in student transportation trying.

“To limit the cost, we’re trying to yield some savings out of reduced routes, more efficient routes, to try to keep cost of transportation down,” Balise said.

By looking at routes and incorporating non-public students into the mix, he said start and stop times and logistics would need sorting out.

“Some students would find the new routes different than what they’ve been accustomed to,” he said, but added there would be an overall savings of $500,000. “We’ve done a lot to try and shrink this down. We didn’t want busses on the road with just a few children on them.”

Cuts would have an impact, he admitted.

“This is something we are trying to address system-wide,” Balise told the board. “We’ve looked at utility contracts, not lowering air condition temperatures as much in summertime and in wintertime lowering the thermostat. It’s an environmental thing, not a huge impact, but we expect to save $200,000. Substitute teachers were a pretty substantial target, we can target $250,000. Athletic trainers who work full-time after school, to help with injuries and rehab on students who get typical injuries playing athletics. We do know we have training programs for our coaches, athletic directors and PE teachers. So eliminating this contract, we feel comfortable eliminating it at this time.”

Board Chairwoman Roberta S. Wise was the first to respond. “There are things in here I hate to see go, but that’s what happens when your budget is cut,” she said.

“We made sure the classroom was protected,” Balise said.

“By far the hugest cost is opening the high school and all positions related to that,” said board member Michael K. Lukas. “I don’t know who coined the phrase, but someone called it ‘opening costs.’ These numbers quite clearly say these things don’t go away. This or next board might be careful not to use that phrase, call it ‘operational costs.’ I’m looking at the number of teachers we planned to hire but now can’t. There have been 39 transfers of teachers within the system. Had we received the funding we were assured of, we would hire those teachers rather tha