Deputy Superintendent of Schools Sheldon Dumain announced at the last Mineola Board of Education meeting that this year the state of New York is requesting that the district's budget be presented in a new fashion.

This year there has been a number of changes in the requirements of the state in relation to school taxes, the best publicized being the STAR program, however there were several other changes as well, including the request for the new format in presenting the budget to the voters.

The new requirement calls for the school district's budget to be presented in a three category format. The three categories are Administrative, Program and Capital.

Issues covered under the Administrative category include the costs for the Board of Education such as paperwork, the clerk and the cost to attend conferences.

Central Administration and Finance are also found under this category.

Under the category Program comes the subjects of Community Service, Contract Transfers and issues of transportation, among others.

Some of the issues to be found under the Capital category are Purchase of Buses, Operation of Plant and Maintenance of Plant. The word Plant refers to the physical building.

The issue of Legal Services comes under both the Administrative category as well as Program because of issues dealing with Special Education, explained Dumain.

The subject of Employee Benefits is found in all three of the categories because with the issue of insurance the state decided it would be better that the benefits should follow with the employee.

So benefits for members of the administration are listed under the heading of Administration, benefits for teachers are listed under the heading Programs and benefits for the custodial staff are listed under the heading Capital.

The school district is required to translate last year's budget into this new format so interested parties can compare and contrast.

The school district is required to present the budget in the normal line by line fashion as well as in the new format, so those interested will be afforded the opportunity to see two forms of the school budget for both last year, '97-'98, and the upcoming year, '98-'99.

This information will be sent to local PTAs and will be available to all potential voters at the schools, and the local libraries.

This year if a budget is voted down then it goes to the public one additional time. If it is voted down again then the district is forced to go to a contingency budget equipped with caps based on 120 percent times the cost of living.

The contingency budget allows for a 4 percent increase in the prior year's budget. There is no transferring of money from one component to another, when the caps of the contingency budget are in place.

For the allowance of changes to the contingency budget there must be certain circumstances that allow for changes such as an influx of 40 to 50 students into the schools.

The budget information is being compiled now and should be available for interested parties to view some time in April, before May 19 which will be the first time ever that all the New York State School Districts will vote for their respective budgets on the same day.