Preston ― The Board of Education Monday unanimously approved a proposed $14.7 million budget for 2023-24 budget that calls for a $1.3 million or 9.8% spending increase.

The proposed school budget increase, the largest so far in the region, comes in a town with a past record of residents repeatedly rejecting budget increases at referendums.

The Board of Finance will hear a presentation from school officials on March 30.

The board’s finance committee already had trimmed $281,067 from the initial proposal, which called for a 11.9% increase. The portion of the school budget funded by taxpayers calls for no new programs or staff, Superintendent Roy Seitsinger said.

The board also will use $97,000 in federal COVID-19 recovery grants to cover some operating costs and another $226,000, three-year pandemic recovery grant to hire an additional part-time school social worker.

School board Chairman Sean Nugent said the finance committee started its work with the enrollment projections, which are climbing steadily. Preston this week has 447 students in preschool through eighth grade. Seitsinger said the district likely will top 450 soon “for the first time in easily a decade.”

Teachers’ union President Susan Strader spoke at the start of Monday’s meeting to ask that central office move out of Preston Plains Middle School as soon as possible due to rising enrollment.

“We’re bursting at the seams,” Strader said. “I believe it’s critically important that central office personnel move out of the middle school. I have a teacher who has not had a classroom of her own for two years. It’s very difficult to work out of someone else’s space.”

The proposed budget includes $30,000 to rent 3,500 square feet of office space for the year. It would house eight to 10 central office staff employees.

School officials hope to share the space and the cost with the town government, which also is experiencing cramped quarters at the Town Hall.

Board member Dan Harris questioned why any of the rental cost should be in the school operating budget, calling it town leased space.

First Selectwoman Sandra Allyn-Gauthier said Tuesday the rental space discussion is preliminary. No town offices have been identified to move out of Town Hall.

“We have space limitations here too,” Allyn-Gauthier said. “We’ve kind of outgrown our space. We need to see what makes sense for us. We do not know what offices yet, and it depends how much space is available.”

Seitsinger said the reasons for the budget increase such as salary increases, health insurance, inflation, special education tuition increases, utilities and fuel costs, are the same as in other area towns.

Seitsinger said the school district was able to lock in a fuel price of $2.86 per gallon, heating fuel at $3.05 per gallon and a health insurance cost increase of 8.4% or lower.

Utility costs, however, are estimated to rise by 20 to 40% with the board budgeting for a 20% increase. High school tuitions were budgeted at $2.28 million, just a 1.8% increase, because nine fewer students are projected to attend Norwich Free Academy. But special education tuition, budgeted at $1.67 million, shows a $303,000 or 22.2% increase.

c.bessette@theday.com