Hampton school sets budget, tax request

In a brief special meeting held Monday night, the Hampton Board of Education gave final approval to the district’s 2024-25 budget and tax asking. The meeting was merely a formality, however, since the budget had been discussed in a public hearing just before the Sept. 9 regular meeting and Hampton taxpayers have had ample opportunity to get informed on the budget at no less  than three public meetings in the past few weeks. 
As approved at Monday’s meeting, Hampton Public School set its general fund budget for 2024-25 at $4.219 million, representing an increase of $349,786 or 9 percent over the current year. The total property tax ask was set at $3,173,887, which represents a $51,633 (1.65 percent) increase over the previous year. The new budget shows a breakdown of $563,424 of real and personal property tax budgeted for bond purposes and $2,610,463 for non-bond purposes. 
The combined total of the district’s property tax request amounts to 69.3 cents for every $100 of valuation, which breaks down into 64.2 cents for the general fund and 2.7 cents for the special building fund. The overall tax rate showed a 16 percent decrease from the previous year. 
Supt. Holly Herzberg pointed out that the tax rate, which would levy the same amount of property taxes as last year, when multiplied by the new total assessed value would be 68.2 cents per $100 of assessed value. 
Besides the budget hearing held prior to the monthly meeting on the 9th (during which there was no one present from the public to give input or ask questions), Hampton patrons had two additional opportunities to ask questions and comment on the proposed budget. The first opportunity came on Thursday morning at the first Community Conversations with Coffee of the new school year, presented by the district at the Hampton Fire Barn. 
After the high school and elementary principals, with the aid of four high school students, gave a presentation on the school’s new Hawk Families program, Herzberg talked for about 20 minutes about the budget with the use of a slide show. The presentation was essentially a repeat of what she had gone over with the school board at the meeting on the 9th and served as a dress rehearsal for the presentation she would make that evening at the Joint Public Tax Request Hearing in Aurora, which is also known as the Pink Postcard meeting. 
Herzberg said the requirement for Hampton to attend the meeting this year was triggered by a change in how it would use its property tax revenues. She explained that since the district’s 
QCPUF bond (used for upgrading the high school building several years ago) will be paid off in December, it was decided to resume taxing in the school’s special building fund for the first time in eight years to build up reserves. She said the change merely represents a shift from the tax revenues going to pay off the bond to going into the building fund. 
Later that evening at the Pink Postcard meeting, held jointly with the City of Aurora at City Hall, Herzberg again showed her slides and explained the rationale for the shift in property taxes. In beginning her presentation, Herzberg told those in attendance (most of whom were there for Aurora’s part of the presentation) she had never had such a big turnout for a budget hearing in her 19 years at Hampton, but said she welcomed the opportunity to talk about her school’s finances. 
“At Hampton we pride ourselves in being really transparent with our finances,” she said. “And again, anyone in here, I welcome you to come meet with me at any time to talk about school finance, because it is my favorite topic of conversation.”
She went on to explain that even though the board could have legally approved its budget and tax ask following its hearing on the 9th, it decided not to do it until after the postcard meeting so that the public would have full opportunity for input before the decision was finalized. She went on to explain that, even though Hampton is well below what it could have asked for in property tax revenues, the district was required to attend the meeting because of a state law passed in 2021. 
“So our revenue limit at Hampton is 2 percent plus real growth,” she explained. “Our real growth in the community of Hampton was .36 this year, so 2.36 is what we could increase our tax request asking, which is a total of just over $57,000. This year in Hampton, we’re actually requesting an increase of taxes of $51,633. Mathematically, you’re saying, ‘Okay, then why are you up here telling us all this stuff?’ … So we’re here based on the fact that we’re choosing to tax in the building fund. Over the last eight years, we told our patrons we weren’t going to do that because we had two different bonds. We were waiting to pay one of those off before we chose to tax again. So also, last year, we were considerably below the amount we could have taxed based on what was called foundation aid and an increase in special education reimbursement to the school.”
Among the few in the room who were there for the Hampton presentation was Karen Bamesberger, secretary of the Hampton Community Development Corporation, who spoke up in support of the work of Hampton Public School.  
“The development corporation has spent 51 years in developing various things in Hampton and, businesswise, we continue to do that,” she said. “We look at the school as a business, and we want the businesses to be well-managed and financially stable, and what Holly has just presented here, we’re very pleased with that,” Bamesberger said. “We work closely with the school board as far as information. When we want information, we go to Holly, go to a school board member, and we’re very pleased. The Hampton Development Corporation is just here to urge the board to go ahead and approve what the school board has put together and Holly has presented.”