According to a Bucks County Herald report, Morrisville School District officials are warning families that if state and federal budgets are not passed soon the district will have to close its doors sometime in January.
Superintendent of Schools Andrew Doster said in a letter issued early this month that state funding covers almost half of the district’s $26.6 million budget and it cannot keep up with payroll and other expenses for the second half of the school year if it doesn’t receive this funding, the report filed by community journalist Peg Quann says.
‘The absence of this critical revenue stream has put Morrisville in an increasingly difficult financial position,” Doster wrote. ‘Our district is now at a point where very difficult decisions must be made for our immediate future,’ the report says.
Doester said, according to the report, if funding from the Commonwealth and the federal government does not flow to the district, it will be forced to close its doors on January 30.
According to publicly available documents, the school district serves approximately 850 students in three schools with a reported student-teacher ratio of around 13:1.
Officials said according to the report the issue would be taken up by the school board at their next meeting.
If by chance the Pennsylvania legislature passes a budget in the very near future then a closure would not occur, Doester said.
Gov. Josh Shapiro introduced his budget last February, calling for $51.47 billion in spending for the 2025-26 fiscal year which runs from July 1 to June 30, but the state’s Democratically controlled House of Representatives and Republican controlled Senate have yet to agree on funding for the fiscal year.
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