The Panther Valley School Board last week adopted a resolution acknowledging the tax limits under Act 1, the Taxpayer Relief Act, for the upcoming fiscal year.

Business manager Jesse Walck said the resolution allows the district to skip the preliminary budget process, committing to no tax increase above the index of 6.4%

The resolution also gives the district more time in formulating its budget for 2025-26, because a tax increase isn’t anticipated at this time, he said.

The board is also looking at bringing additional money back to the district by approving a three-year software contract with Thomson Reuters.

The software, which will cost $8,208 in the first year with 5% increases in the following two years, allows the district to verify that its cyber charter students actually live within the district.

Walck noted that the district sampled the software by randomly selecting and checking the address of one cyber charter student, and found that student had moved out of the district’s boundaries.

He pointed out that this often happens when a student enrolls in a cyber charter school while living in the district, and the family moves and the district isn’t notified.

The district, however, is still paying for this student, whose tuition should now be funded by another school district, he said.

Finding one just one student each year of the contract would cover the cost of software, as tuition is more than $10,000 per student. Walck anticipates finding many more students who may have moved, given the transient nature of the population in the Panther Valley, he said.

In other business, the board approved:

• Resignations of Tiana Barnetti, an intermediate school life skills teacher, effective Dec. 31; and Jo-Anne Petosa, an elementary school secretary, effective Jan. 17.

• Hiring two junior-senior high school teachers, Taylor Craigle, life skills, retroactive to Jan. 2, and Holly Skrimcovsky, English language arts, effect Dec. 17, both at a rate of $45,003, per the union contract.

• Hiring Bonita Damiano as an elementary school secretary at a rate of $17.71 an hour.

• Approved conferences and classes for Kristin Black, Kristine Kostecky, Mary Imossi, Tara Eisley, Mary Ribarchik, Nicole Wynings and Elizabeth Hoherchak.

• Approved the proposed Carbon Lehigh Intermediate Unit 21 Operational and Program Services Budget for 2025-26.

• Approved repository bids for three vacant lots in Lansford: 118 W. Ridge St., 524 E. Front St., and 614 E. Patterson St.

• Approved homebound instruction for an eighth grade students from Dec. 2 to June 1, and a 12th grade student retroactive from Jan. 3 until completion.

• Approved the creation of a family consumer science club for 2024-25 school year, similar to a home economics clubs, at no cost to the district.

• Approved medical leave for an employee from Jan. 6 to Jan. 22.

• Approved Amber McFadden, an elementary school teacher, to be placed in the master’s degree column of union pay scale.

• Heard letters of thanks from the intermediate school’s Student Leadership for School Board Appreciation Month.

• Heard from Violet Uher, a fifth grade student, whose artwork was selected for the 2025 Pennsylvania Attorney General Drug-Free Calendar.