ADAMS TWP — Thanks to a concerted savings effort by administration as well as cafeteria workers on the brink of being furloughed, the Mars School Board was able to pass a 2011-12 budget with lower expenditures than the preliminary budget.

District solicitor Tom King announced Tuesday night that the district’s cafeteria workers’ union presented administrators with a contract proposal that will save the district the same amount it would have saved in furloughing the employees.

The final budget is $37.2 million, and the property tax rate will remain at 99 mills.

The concessions by cafeteria workers allowed them to remain employees of the district. The board had considered turning its food services to a private contractor for which the employees would have worked.