BUFFALO, N.Y. — Like a lot of local governments and a lot of schools, Buffalo Public Schools now faces a multimillion dollar shortfall.
It is projected to hit $90 million because of the coronavirus outbreak.
How does the district plan to fill that gap?
The district shared its plan with Buffalo Common Council on Wednesday during a virtual budget session. The district's chief financial officer, Geoffrey Pritchard, called the budget a "survivable budget," and he warned of possible cuts to staff.
Now in order to fill that projected $90 million gap, the district says that it is relying on reduced state aid and an influx of federal funds.
You may be surprised to hear that the district is actually seeing some savings during the pandemic on things such as on overtime, health-care costs and school operations.
The plan is to take that savings and fill a big part of the shortfall.
"We do have some reductions that are in the planning process. Right now we're still working on those plans on exactly on what that might be. It might be some staff, overtime, maybe some contracts or vendor spending that we might have to reduce," Pritchard said.
But there is no doubt that these are financially challenging times Buffalo Schools says that it plans to lose about 10 percent in sales tax revenue and that transportation costs are on the rise.
As for summer school, the district says that it has the money for summer learning and that is built into the current budget year, but as far as what summer school actually looks like that is still a big question mark.