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City school officials say unforeseen costs threw the budget off; others say they should have known.

By BETH QUIMBY, Staff Writer August 12, 2007

When it comes to explaining how they overspent their budget by $2.5 million last year, Portland school administrators put rising special-education costs near the top of the list of contributing factors.

In press releases and public discussions, School Superintendent Mary Jo O'Connor blamed state and federal government mandates for pushing up special-education costs by $325,000 to hire 12 more special-ed personnel than anticipated. O'Connor said another $300,000 in special-education overspending was caused by unexpected cost increases for contracted services, such as transportation and out-of district tuitions.

But Portland special-education director Barbara Dee said most of the costs O'Connor cited were not unexpected at all.

Dee contends that the actual cost for unanticipated contracted services was closer to a third of the $300,000 mentioned by O'Connor. Dee said she had anticipated needing 12 new staffers months earlier -- when the budget was being prepared -- and initially the budget included money for those positions.

Specialists elsewhere say that special-education budgets often get the blame when it comes to soaring education costs. They say that although special education might cost more per student than regular education, there is no reason why, through careful planning, districts cannot keep their spending in line.

"You kind of expect to get blindsided," said Murray Shulman, special-ed director in Bangor.

Dee said she advised against cuts because strict and inflexible federal and state rules dictate the ratio of teachers and technicians to special-education students.

For example, in Maine there must be one teacher and one education technician for every eight students in so-called functional life skills classrooms, which include students with severe disabilities.

Education costs are also determined by special teams assigned to each child identified as requiring special-education services. A team includes teachers, psychologists, other specialists and the child's parents, who decide what services the child needs.

That could be 20 minutes of speech therapy three times a week or placements outside the school district that can cost $60,000 to $100,000 a year, said Jill Adams, executive director of the Maine Administrators of Services for Children with Disabilities.

In Portland, special-education costs for last year are not available.

But in 2005-2006, that spending totaled $12.4 million, or about 16 percent of the $78 million budget. The money was used to educate the roughly 1,100 students who receive special-ed services each year in Portland. Of the 1,200 Portland school district staff, about 268 are devoted to special education, not counting bus drivers.

Contrary to widely held assumptions, Portland's special- education enrollment is lower than the statewide average. According to state Department of Education data, 16.6 percent of Portland's total school enrollment last year involved students in special education, compared to 18.1 percent statewide.

A FINE ART

Special-education administrators say balancing a school district's budget is a fine art. They say they have gotten much better at it in the 32 years since the passage of the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, requiring public school districts to educate children with disabilities.

School administrators said the trick is to set budgets able to accommodate the costs of educating unexpected students, who might require tens of thousands of dollars in special services, depending on the severity of their disabilities.

To do so, administrators evaluate incoming kindergarten classes and keep in touch with preschool programs to try to figure out how many new students will require special-education services in the coming years. They also monitor the services needed by the students already in the schools.

Today, there are software programs that help them closely...