PITTSFIELD — Budget critics in SAD 53 should not be so quick to cry foul with the report of an apparently excessive surplus from the 1989-90 school budget, according to Superintendent Terry McCannell.

McCannell responded Friday to the “I-told-you-sos” by providing a breakdown to the $421,149 budget surplus reported at the Monday night school board meeting.

McCannell said, “They (budget critics) felt we were overbudgeted, and on that point they were right.”

But the critics were not right on the reasons for a surplus, McCannell said. He stressed that he knew precisely where the overbudgeted accounts are, and also the accounts overspent. But he can’t explain why the accounts were overbudgeted because that budget was prepared before he took the job as superintendent. He explained that in response to budget critics last spring, he attempted to project the potential surplus by “running out the budget.” This scenario is done on the basis that all accounts will be spent, he said, less unanticipated income and unallocated funds, which is where the projection of $16,600 in surplus came from.

Budget critics last spring, and several unofficially now, have suggested that the board had hidden accounts in the budget all along. Repeatedly the critics pointed to a certificate of deposit they believed was carried through the year. The account is actually a pyramid account, he said, that is used to pay the final salary account for teachers in June. The critics pointed to this account as a means to reduce the amount to be raised by taxes for the next budget. The account, McCannell said was expended as planned. It is not until the budget is audited after the fiscal year ends June 30 that an actual surplus can be identified.

This year that audit revealed $421,149 surplus remaining, a large portion of which was overbudgeting in the secondary education and special services accounts totaling $194,409. McCannell explained the secondary education account as an overestimate on the number of students at MCI. (The same may be true this year with nearly 400 anticipated and 376 actually attending.) In the special services account, he pointed to the largest portion as the $50,000 budgeted for a residential placement that was not used, but must be available.

In addition, McCannell reported that $66,806 in the surplus is unanticipated revenue. By subtracting the additional revenue from the identified surplus, the surplus from the proposed budget becomes $354,342. By further reducing the surplus by those accounts that the board has the least control over, the secondary education and special services, McCannell points to an actual surplus of about $160,000, a figure, he said, that is not considered significant for a $6 million budget, according to the Department of Education.

Regardless of where it came from, the biggest question on the minds of school board members and the community appears to be what to do with it.

McCannell reported at the Monday night meeting that Pittsfield Town Manager Dwight Dogherty said the district should keep the funds to reduce the amount raised by taxes in the next budget. He also suggested that a portion of the funds be allocated to capital projects on a one-time funding basis.

“That’s good administrative advice,” McCannell said. “and I appreciated that.”

While some board members favored holding a hearing to give the surplus funds back to the towns, Dogherty doesn’t appear to want it. He conceded that the money would serve the greatest benefit to the taxpayers in an investment account with the district, earning interest and being applied toward the next budget or capital improvements.

If the money were to be given back by a district hearing vote, the town of Detroit could anticipate $46,410, Burnham $81,197 and Pittsfield $292,698. To return the funds to individual taxpayers, Dogherty said, new tax bills would have to issued, and rebates to those people who already have paid. The office time involved for issuing new bills, rebate checks and the postage would add a significant cost to returning the money. The costs would not make the process as practical as investing, Dogherty said.