Hamburg Area Schools to Set Aside $2.5M for HS Renovation

The Hamburg Area School Board is scheduled to vote Monday, Oct. 26, on a set of bookkeeping moves that would set aside $2,500,000 of the district's savings for a future high school renovation and $2,330,065 to cover the gap in this year's budget, according to the agenda the district posted Oct. 22. The meeting starts at 6:30 p.m. in the James A. Gilmartin Community Room at Hamburg Area High School, 701 Windsor St., Hamburg. Doors open at 6:20 p.m.

What the board is moving, and why it matters

Fund balance is a school district's accumulated savings, what is left at the end of each year after the bills are paid. "Assigned" fund balance is money the board has earmarked for a stated purpose. "Unassigned" fund balance has no designation and can be spent on anything. "Committed" and "restricted" balances are tied up by a formal board action or by outside rules.

Item VII.B asks the board, "As of June 30, 2026," to approve five moves:

• "move $10,113.61 from Committed Fund Balance to Unassigned Fund Balance"
• "move $1,274 from Restricted Fund Balance to Unassigned Fund Balance"
• "move $2,330,065 from Unassigned Fund Balance to Assigned Fund Balance for the 2026-2027 General Fund budget shortfall"
• "move $4,185,751 from Assigned Fund Balance to Unassigned Fund Balance for the 2025-2026 General Fund budget shortfall"
• "move $2,500,000 from Unassigned Fund Balance to Assigned Fund Balance for future capital projects/HS renovation project"

Read together, the moves show a yearly cycle. The agenda describes the $4,185,751 as money earmarked "for the 2025-2026 General Fund budget shortfall." That year has closed, so the board is releasing the earmark. At the same time it is earmarking $2.33 million for this year's gap and $2.5 million for the high school. Together the five moves leave the unassigned balance about $633,000 lower than before. The agenda lists no balances before or after, and it does not say how much of the $4.19 million the district spent.

Both shortfall figures match the district's adopted budgets to the dollar. The 2025-26 final budget, posted on the business office's annual budget page, estimated $53,780,230 in revenue against $57,965,981 in spending, a gap of $4,185,751. The 2026-27 final budget estimates $55,778,373 in revenue and $58,108,438 in spending, a gap of $2,330,065. That budget raised the property tax rate to 27.9 mills from 26.96 mills, about 3.5 percent, the most the state's Act 1 index allowed, and still planned to draw the difference from savings. The school tax is usually the largest line on a Berks property tax bill, as our property tax guide explains.

The high school money

The 2026-27 budget estimated the district would start July 1 with about $30.6 million in committed, assigned and unassigned fund balance, $27.9 million of it already assigned. In a justification the state budget form requires, the district wrote that the assigned money is "Reserved for upcoming high school renovation project and other renovation projects"; a year earlier the same line read only "Reserved for future building improvement and renovation projects." The board's Oct. 12 committee agenda listed the renovation transfer as "Move TBD"; the Oct. 26 agenda fills in the amount at $2,500,000. Neither agenda gives a cost estimate, scope or timeline for the renovation.

Also on the agenda

• Approval of the "2027-2028 General Fund Budget Calendar," which the Oct. 12 committee reviewed. The calendar is not attached to the three-page agenda.
• Approval of minutes from Sept. 28 and Oct. 12. Neither set is posted on the district's minutes page, where the newest minutes are from Sept. 14.
• Ratifying four class accounts, for the classes of 2027 through 2030, in the high school activity account.
• A first review of Board Policy 102, Academic Standards.
• Approval of a "Middle School After-School Pokémon Club to run on a one-year trial basis."
• Logan Monroe as "Junior High Wrestling Head Coach (50%) & Game Help," effective Oct. 27, at an annual stipend of $1,604.50 (step 2).
• Four building-level volunteers: Thomas Walters Jr., Nancy Kepner, Arlan Dietrich and Amanda Smith.
• Recognition of German American Partnership Program visitors, plus the monthly treasurer's reports and invoices.

None of the Oct. 12 committee's personnel, curriculum or field-trip recommendations appears on the Oct. 26 agenda, among them the recommendation to hire Mark Boyer as chief financial officer "at a salary of $159,135," with chief financial officer Michele Zimmerman's retirement moved to Feb. 15, 2027, from Jan. 15. Only the budget calendar and the fund-balance moves carried over. The committee has taken binding votes before. Superintendent Christopher Beissel's five-year contract passed 7-0 at the Sept. 14 committee meeting. With the Oct. 12 minutes unposted, the record does not show whether the Boyer hire was approved that night.

How to attend or comment

The meeting is Monday, Oct. 26, 2026, at 6:30 p.m. in the Gilmartin Community Room at the high school. Under the agenda's rules, anyone who wants to speak on an agenda item or make general comments "must fill out a Public Comment Request Form and submit it to the Board Secretary prior to the start of the meeting," and each speaker gets five minutes. The district's school board page lists the board's email as schoolboard@hasdhawks.org.

The board's only November meeting is Monday, Nov. 9, at 6:30 p.m.; its reorganization meeting is Wednesday, Dec. 2, at 6:30 p.m. To find meetings for your own township, borough and school board, see our Berks meeting schedule guide. We will post a recap once minutes are available.