By raising taxes and cutting spending, Jamestown Area School Board hopes to have a nearly balanced budget for board approval in June.

The school board is eyeing a 2.4-mill increase in Mercer County and a 0.98-mill increase in Crawford County. The school district, which operated on a $6.4 million budget this year, includes students who live in both counties.

The current tax bill is 35.41 mills in Crawford County and 49.2 mills in Mercer County. As it stands, the school budget, counting the tax increases, has a $60,000 to $80,000 deficit due to hefty increases in retirement and health care expenses.

After renegotiating with the Health Care Consortium, the school district's health care agent, the increase in this year's premium dropped from 35 percent to 28 percent.

Director Paul Csonka asked if the school board could use a different health care insurance provider.

"If we are locked into another year with the consortium, then we are locked in for another year," Csonka said. "I'm just trying to find ways to save some money."

Superintendent David Shaffer explained a difficulty with independent school boards within the consortium securing quotes. When an insurance company gives a quote to the consortium, it can sometimes be at a discounted rate, he said. If the company were to offer a rate to an independent school district within the consortium, that would place the insurance in competition with itself, Shaffer said.

Other budget shortfalls will be made up by trimming $35,000 from the equipment budget and $78,000 from the staff budget, according to the proposed plan.

Another factor that may help the school district is a proposed 2.5 percent increase in subsidy it gets from the state.

"If the governor gets his 2.5 percent increase through, this will put us at pretty close to a balanced budget," Shaffer said.

The school board is contemplating a $7.5 million high school renovation project.

Shaffer said the proposed millage increase took into consideration money to pay for the renovation this year.