NASHUA – School budget committee members will meet Wednesday to review district spending in the first quarter of the fiscal year, including more than $100,000 in added expenses retiring teachers have cost over officials’ estimates so far this year.

District officials planned on paying retiring teachers and other employees about $600,000 this year, but have doled out more than $700,000 in the first three months of the fiscal year, in part because of an unexpected retirement by an administrator, according to information from the school district.

Board of Education President Bob Hallowell said the board makes estimates about what it will have to pay retiring teachers and administrators for banked sick time in February. Knowing those figures are educated guesses, the board has a reserve account it can tap to cover the overages.

“In February, we knew that number was going to be close to what we budgeted and potentially go over, and I think we had one administrator retire that we didn’t anticipate,” Hallowell said. “So, that bumped the number up, so we took a calculated risk.”

Money for the reserve account comes from other budget areas that are in the black, Hallowell said.

Twenty-four teachers are retiring this year and are being paid a total of $711,000 for unused sick time, according to a 2013 severance cost report. Hallowell said that number is about average.

“We’ve had as few as 11 and as many as I believe 56,” he said.

The employees were paid an average of about $29,625, the largest payments of more than $38,000 going to Birch Hill Elementary School special education teacher Nancy Simeone and Fairgrounds Middle School guidance counselor Laura Dunn.

Teachers are the primary recipients of the budget’s retirement and separation pay, Hallowell said, but some other employees qualify for the unused sick time payments, including administrators and secretaries.

“For the most part, the vast majority of the severance is for teachers,” he said.

Hallowell said the board decided that creating a reserve account was the best way to combat over-spending of the retirement and separation pay fund.

“At the time we did our budgeting, we knew that number was running a little high,” Hallowell said. “Rather than take anything else out of the budget, we chose to use a small amount out of the surplus.”

The Board of Education will meet at 7 p.m. Tuesday to discuss finance and operations concerns. The Budget Committee will meet at 6 p.m. Wednesday to address budget concerns, Hallowell said.

Emily Hoyt can be reached at 594-6402 or ehoyt@nashuatelegraph.com. Also, follow Hoyt on Twitter (@Telegraph_Hoyt).