Sharon Springs Central School District Business Manager Tony DiPace will shift to parttime starting next school year. Photo by Chris English.

SHARON SPRINGS — Tony DiPace, full-time business manager in the Sharon Springs Central School District the last 27 years, is shifting to a part-time status starting next school year as part of an administrative restructuring worked out between him and Superintendent Tom Yorke, DiPace announced at the Monday, April 13 school board meeting.

While the announcement came on the same night the board approved a 2026-27 budget resolution calling for an $11.6 million budget, a 2.4 percent property tax increase (the state cap for the district) and some staff cuts that district voters will consider on May 19, Yorke indicated in an email after the meeting the move with DiPace was not budget related.

"This was being planned anyway," Yorke wrote.

"I'll still be around, I'm not going anywhere," DiPace said after the meeting of the change in his status starting next school year. "It's an honor to have had this job for as long as I've had. It's a great place to work and I will miss it, but I will still be around."

In addition to being the district's top financial official, DiPace explained that he has also always directed and overseen cafeteria services, transportation services, the custodial staff and basically all non-instructional departments at the school. With the change, he said Yorke will be handling more of those duties though he will still help while also heading up finances and the budget. DiPace estimated the change will mean he will be working around two-thirds of his current full-time load.

In other details on the 2026-27 budget, DiPace said the proposal has the district using all $1 million of its remaining unallocated fund balance (surplus). However, he added that it's unlikely the district will actually use that much next school year and in fact mentioned the possibility of using none of it.

"We've always budgeted conservatively and worked hard to cut costs, so we're hoping not to spend any of it," said DiPace, who added that the unallocated fund balance does not include a total of about $2 million in reserves the district holds in various accounts.

The layoffs will include three full-time teachers, one part-time teacher and a full-time teacher's assistant. Yorke has already spoken to the people involved, it was announced at the April 13 meeting. DiPace said the cuts will likely mean larger elementary grade class sizes next school year.

DiPace said the 2026-27 budget was put together and the resolution approved despite the state not yet having passed its own budget, and the district being about 59 percent funded by the state.

"Our budget is based on what we think we know," DiPace said. "I feel fairly confident in these numbers."

He added that through negotiation, district officials were able to reduce a projected increase in employee health insurance from 17 percent down to 10 percent. "I feel pretty fortunate we were able to do that," DiPace noted.

Before the vote, DiPace and school board members again lamented what they feel is a lack of state support for public education, particularly for small, rural school districts like Sharon Springs. The budget projects a foundational state aid increase of only 1 or 2 percent for 2026-27.

School Board president Helen Roberts read an article from a local newspaper from back in 2012 that was talking about the same thing.

"Upstate New York pays more and gets less," from the state, she said. "It's been an ongoing thing and nothing has been done."

School board member Christine Cornwell added "If they don't (increase state aid), what are small schools going to do?" She said she keeps hoping "Leadership will recognize the disaster that is happening in front of them and do something about it," but that her hopes keep going unfulfilled.

In other matters at the April 13 meeting, the school board accepted the retirement at the end of this school year of speech language pathologist Rosemary Shaw, who has been with the school district the last eight years and before that worked for Schoharie County and also held other jobs.

"She's been a wonderful employee, a dynamic educator," Yorke said."She will be very hard to replace."

The board also accepted the resignation of elementary teacher McKenzie Rivenburgh and granted tenure to Lindsay Blowers (K-12 school counselor), Max Horning (music education teacher), Alex Yorke (7-12 earth science teacher) and Ruth Ann Galasso (1-6 students with disabilities teacher).

Also approved was the 2026-27 school holiday and Board of Education meeting calendars and the enrollment of one out-of-district student for next school year.