BVA board to discuss budget tonight

By Kaylie Moore
kmoore@yourmvi.com
Belle Vernon Area School Board will host a special meeting at 7 p.m. today, in the hopes of approving a preliminary budget ahead of next week’s deadline.
During the board’s monthly meeting Monday, tensions rose when resident John Habel III of Washington Township asked why the 2019-20 general fund budget approval has “been delayed” and wasn’t on the agenda sooner.
Superintendent Dr. Michele Dowell said she recommended the board move the meeting to Thursday because of lack of available time to work through budget details prior to Tuesday’s primary election.
“We’ve had special meetings for the budget. We did it last year,” Dowell said. “We didn’t approve it until the last day of the month last year, so this gives us a little more time to look at that.”
Board President Lou Rood said the three newest directors, Stacey Livengood, Dan Engstrom and Dan Kovatch, have spent extra time learning about how the budget process works since being appointed in February.
“We want to do our due diligence when it comes to the budget. It’s very important,” Rood said. “With everything else that’s been going on, we felt it would be best to postpone it to concentrate on the budget, and the budget alone.”
Several board members also said they’ve been meeting in small groups of “no more than four” to go over budget items, so as not to have a quorum and avoid a violation of the state Sunshine Act for holding private meetings.

To read the rest of the story, please see a copy of Thursday’s Mon Valley Independent, call 724-314-0035 to subscribe or subscribe to our online edition at http://monvalleyindependent.com.