On Nov. 4, the Salisbury Township School District board held its operations committee meeting.

To open the meeting, the board committee discussed possible debt restructuring for the district. After reviewing different options with different price tags and projected savings amounts, the committee requested additional information be provided before making a decision when the proposal comes up on the agenda at the next regular school board meeting.

“The first step is to, over the years, increase our fund balance,” board member Samuel DeFrank said. “Several years of increasing this balance will lead to an increase in credit worthiness and help us to get the most we can possibly borrow to build the best school system we can.”

Following the discussion on finances for the district and putting monetary needs in perspective was a presentation on district facilities by Associate Superintendent, Lynn Fuini-Hetten. She requested input from the school board about which direction they would like to pursue in regard to construction and rehabbing district buildings.

Design firm Fielding International was on site last spring, at which time the representatives conducted surveys and building visits in order to provide a detailed report with several options for how to move forward.

Several board members seemed to be leaning toward recommending the option of building a new K-8 school and administration facility on the western side of town, citing savings incurred by only having two buildings to staff and maintain, as well as opening up the possibility to sell no-longer used properties, which would contribute to tax revenue for the district.

However, board members balked at the amount of money some of these options would require at the outset.

Carol Klinger was one such board member, saying, “There are too many things swirling. How can we take on a borrow at this level when the budget has the issues it does?”

Board Secretary Mike Taylor responded by noting, “Any of these options, borrowing at any of these levels, likely means no construction could be done in the next 20-25 years. Any of the other options ... are Band-Aids.”

The board discussion resulted in a request for a detailed report focusing on the costs versus efficiencies of the different options detailed by Fielding International, including tax revenue of any sold properties.

The newly formed strategic financial planning committee will look at and put together this information, based on estimates, to show a range of overall costs to the district.

Fuini-Hetten closed the discussion by saying, “(I don’t want to) table (this discussion) because we don’t know what we can afford; six months from now we still might not know what we can afford. We just need to take small steps forward - I don’t want the decision made for us,” referencing the possibility a new heating, ventilation and air conditioning system may be needed at the middle school, which would come with a nearly $10 million price tag.

The next meeting of the operations committee will be held Dec. 2 via Zoom.