Norwich — Alderman Joseph DeLucia was greeted with silence Thursday when he asked members of a joint committee of City Council and Board of Education members for a recommendation for a total 2020-21 school budget somewhere between the $88 million school officials say they need to break even and the $83 million the city manager has proposed.

The ad hoc joint committee was established last winter to try to improve communications between the council and school board, especially in understanding the complexities of school budgeting. But for the second consecutive week, the committee spent two hours in remote access meetings delving into specific costs, especially focused on regular and special education tuition at Norwich Free Academy, and members fell silent when Chairman DeLucia asked for a bottom line school budget recommendation.

School Superintendent Kristen Stringfellow affirmed that her initial proposed budget of $88.4 million is what the school district would need to meet educational needs and state and federal mandates and break even without relying on any deficit spending from the city’s undesignated surplus fund. The Board of Education in March realized that 9.1% increase would be unreasonable and approved an $85.5 million total budget, a 5.5% increase that still would need supplemental deficit funding from the city.

“I’m getting myself off the floor,” Alderwoman Stacy Gould said after hearing the $88 million break-even total. “Plus the grants.”

The school district funds numerous programs and about 40% of teaching staff through grants totaling about $15 million.

Stringfellow was adamant that the $1.9 million, or 2.4%, increase City Manager John Salomone included in his proposed 2020-21 budget was far short of what is needed. She told the joint committee expenses in “almost every category” are rising “much higher” than that percentage, including salaries, health insurance, high school and special education tuition and transportation.

While the final projected bill for NFA is not yet known, school officials are projecting regular and special education tuition alone at $24.1 million, an increase of $1.5 million, or 7%, over this year’s total. Norwich Public Schools pays NFA another $7 million for paraeducators and support staff for Norwich special education students attending the academy.

Norwich school officials have asked the City Council to separate NFA costs from the district’s preschool through eighth grade costs when making budget decisions. In the past, cuts to the school budget have fallen entirely on the lower grades, because the district has no control over high school regular and special education tuitions.

Norwich Mayor Peter Nystrom hopes to schedule a meeting with NFA Head of School David Klein, who will depart NFA at the end of June, and academy finance officials and Norwich city and school officials to discuss possible ways to cut costs. Nystrom told the joint committee Thursday that meeting has not yet been scheduled.

The joint ad hoc committee will meet again May 21 to try to make a school budget recommendation after hearing from both the public and the full school board.

The City Council will hold a teleconference budget hearing at 7:30 p.m. Monday, with call-in instructions on the agenda, with email comments from the public due by 7 p.m. to mayorsoffice@cityofnorwich.org. The Board of Education will discuss the budget at its 5:30 p.m. meeting Tuesday, also by remote access.

c.bessette@theday.com