The Gloucester County School Board adopted a $74,911,392 budget for fiscal year 2020 during its work session last Thursday, coming up short of the $80.5 million FY20 budget request it initially made to county supervisors.

The operating budget for the coming fiscal year will be at $61,796,240, less than the $64,072,293 sought by the board. Money for capital improvements was also cut, with the board seeking over $10 million but getting just $6.9 million. The total local increase proposed by the board was $3.5 million while supervisors only boosted their increase by $1.2 million.

The board was forced to cut 11.5 proposed new positions and instead will only add a school counselor each at Botetourt Elementary and Abingdon Elementary. The board was also unable to increase the school calendar by four days to bring it to 180 days as requested. In addition, the board cut all of its proposed categorical increases.

School division superintendent Walter Clemons said, despite the cuts, he was ab...