CHAPPAQUA — The Chappaqua School District would have to lay off almost 50 people, including perhaps 23 teachers, to bring in a budget with no spending increase for next year.

The school board in November asked the administration to develop a budget holding spending level with this year’s $107 million budget in response to the difficult economic times that are hitting even well off communities like Chappaqua. Because of cost increases, that amounts to a more than $6 million cut. But parents at a meeting last night at Horace Greeley High School, when the plan was first introduced, are already urging the board to reverse the cuts and it’s not clear how the final budget will take shape.

A public hearing is planned for Feb. 10 to get more community input and the final budget vote is May 19.

The cuts were planned to preserve as much of the current student experience as possible, said Superintendent David Fleishman, but the impact will be felt in things like shorter elementary art periods, fewer extra sessions of speech therapy beyond the required amount for special education students, less health and consumer science in the middle school, small increases in class size in some subjects at the high school and less new technology district wide.

(Report courtesy of Elizabeth Ganga/The Journal News.)