As previously mentioned, the school district needs to trim about $18.5 million in order to avoid a tax increase. Poughkeepsie Journal on the most recent school board meeting contained some interesting trivia.
[T]he school board is asking all its 1,500 employees to agree to a salary freeze next year. … District Superintendent Frank Pepe has estimated the district would save about $3.75 million if all the district’s employees agreed to salary freezes in 2009-10. [emphasis mine]
That’s a big number but only $2,500 per employee.
Now where will you find the other $14.75 million?
There are 726 teachers, and 91 “other professionals,” whatever that means. Let’s assume for the sake of argument that those are employees whose salaries are counted in the $125 million “program component” of the budget. Roughly, very roughly, speaking, that’s $153,000 per person, which is a tidy sum even for the New York metropolitan area. Perhaps if we ask nicely, the district will say what the median salary is.