BY DAN HILDEBRAN
The Union County School District’s finance director warned school board members that the district’s budget is getting tighter and that a change in mindset is essential for the school system to maintain board-mandated fund balance levels. Superintendent Mike Ripplinger said the district may no longer be able to fully bear the costs of some extracurricular activities and may ask families or organizations to pick up part of the tab.
Renae Prevatt told the school board during a September 10 workshop that the district’s final adjusted fund balance will be four percent of revenues, below the five percent target set by the board. She added that further reserve erosion is likely unless district officials cut spending.
Prevatt blamed the potential budget crisis on teacher salaries that have risen faster than state appropriations to school districts. The finance director said that before both instructional and non-instructional pay schedules rose, the district realized significant savings when it replaced a retiring teacher with a younger, less expensive instructor. That is no longer the case.
Prevatt added that over the last two or three years, extra federal dollars spurred by the COVID-19 Pandemic masked the growth of expenses without the corresponding revenue increase.
Cutting back on books
The finance director said she and her staff have been scrutinizing expenditures more diligently and that she is trying to instill a miserly attitude in administrators and district personnel.
“We have, for lack of a better term, really been micromanaging, really looking at each line item a lot closer this year,” she said. “Mr Ripplinger or myself have sat down with each of the principals, even from purchasing curriculum down to hey, do we need 180 books, or can we get away with 170 or 175? That sort of thing. And I can definitely say that our school-level administrators and even the special programs administrators are all very mindful of, just because they have a line item in the budget, that is not their goal to spend (that amount).”
Ripplinger said the school district is not alone in struggling to maintain adequate reserves. He told board members that other local governments and school districts across the state face the same challenges the Union County district is encountering.
Families may have to pay
The superintendent added that as positions become vacant throughout the year, he will think twice before filling them with new employees. He also said that students’ families or community groups may have to start sharing the financial burden for costs the district now fully pays, like transportation to athletic events or extracurricular activities.
“We have assumed costs that generally, in most other places, those costs are borne by students, their teams, organizations,” he said. “Just to give you an example: whenever a student goes on a competition trip, we always pay for that. We pay for the transportation, and that is a huge blessing. Most other places don’t do that.”
The superintendent added that now, the district pays for event ticket takers, allowing teams to pocket all gate and concessions revenues. He said that in the future, schools’ athletic departments may have to share in that cost.
Ripplinger acknowledged that district officials would likely face a backlash if it asked parents to share in costs previously borne solely by the school system.
“I understand if we begin to go down that road,” he told board members, “even if not that they pay their fair share, but we begin to say we need you to shoulder a little bit of this burden, that is not going to be a well-received message, but we may get to the point where something like that may have to happen.”
