North Penn’s school board saw a comparison of the 2024-25 and 2025-26 budget revenues and expenses during the board finance committee meeting on April 8, 2025. (Image courtesy of North Penn School District)
Board argues for increase with high school, capital projects pending
A $348 million 2025-26 budget with a 4 percent tax increase is now on the books for the North Penn School District.
School board members voted unanimously on Wednesday night to adopt that budget, outlining one last time the reasons for doing so.
“The board is raising taxes to the maximum allowed under the Act 1 index because it’s critical to balance our budget responsibly, limit additional borrowing, and protect our Moody’s credit rating, which is phenomenal,” said board President Cathy McMurtrie.
In May the board voted to advertise the draft budget with the full 4 percent increase, in early June heard a brief update, and during the board’s June 18 meeting, they made it official, with McMurtrie explaining that the budget funds the year-to-year operations of the district, while also allocating part of a surplus to the high school and more to capital reserves for projects across the district.
“At the same time, we must address the urgent and growing needs for our aging infrastructure, and most importantly, meet the needs of all of our students going forward. So we support this,” she said.
Board member Tina Stoll added that the district recently had a visit from the state’s auditor general, who had singled out North Penn in 2023 for having large reserves while also increasing taxes each year, and during that visit he and state lawmakers saw the high school and the need for renovations up close.
“They were teaching our students about financial responsibility, making sure that you have a good credit rating for when you go out and borrow money, and how important it is to save up for things. And that’s what we basically have been doing here: protecting our credit rating, and making sure we have money in our capital fund budget for the major upcoming project that we have going on,” Stoll said.
Board member Juliane Ramic added “a shoutout to our business office” for steering the budget discussions through staff turnover, and keeping the process “streamlined and on target,” and to the department heads who gave those budget presentations over the past few months, calling it a fascinating process.
“To be able to hear from department heads about their needs, their plan, their vision, and what is needed to help support our students in moving forward each year. It is always an enlightening process, I learn something new every year, but also see the pattern, and see the need, and the level of integrity and detail that goes into all of this,” she said.
Board member Tim MacBain said “Harrisburg has a lot to do with” the state budget process, including the annual education subsidies proposed by the governor and approved by the legislature, plus a new proposed house bill 1500 which could reform the way charter and cyber schools are funded.
“North Penn has had to pay an increasing cost for these types of educational institutions. This year, we are in need of $236,000 more than last year; in 2024-25 it was $460,000 more. And while we do have a high price tag for those students, we never really get to see what types of success stories or not come out of those institutions,” he said.
That bill has already been passed by the state house and is awaiting attention from the state senate, and MacBain said local residents can contact their state lawmakers to urge them to support a new funding formula.
After approving the budget unanimously, the board did the same for three near-identical motions, each adopting a separate budget for an enterprise fund that operates apart from the general fund. Detailed presentations on those budgets totaling roughly $260,000 for community education; $3.4 million for extended care, and $8.1 million for school nutrition services were given during special budget workshops, and each is available online.
Other budget-related items also approved by the board included a list of real estate tax assessment appeals that will be filed by the district’s business office on properties they argue are undervalued based on recent sales data, and two appeal settlements for similar challenges done in prior years.
One item indirectly related to the budget drew comments from the public: the board unanimously approved a fifth time extension for the sale of the ‘Movie Lot’ properties in Hatfield Township to a local developer, after an objection by resident Jason Lanier that a court hearing related to that sale had not been advertised properly. After several minutes of back-and-forth with the resident, district solicitor Kyle Somers said the current motion to extend the due diligence period, and the original agreement of sale, had both been posted publicly by the board and that the board had “no Sunshine Act concern, and there is no basis to not move forward with this.”
North Penn’s school board next meets at 7 p.m. on July 7; for more information visit www.NPenn.org.
This article appears courtesy of a content share agreement between North Penn Now and The Reporter. To read more stories like this, visit https://www.thereporteronline.com
