SAD 30 approves $3.4 million bare-bones budget

LEE – Members of the SAD 30 school board approved a proposed school budget of $3.4 million Tuesday.

Superintendent Jeff Fish described the proposal as a bare-bones budget. “There is no fat in this,” he said. “This reflects losing one teacher at the Lee-Winn School because of declining enrollments.”

He said cutting one teaching position did not mean the person would be out of a job, but through staff transfers may hold another job. Fish said he fears the solution may only be short-term based on the findings of an earlier enrollment study.”

Fish said the study indicated a continued decline in enrollments through 2009. “What that shows us is we are going to be losing kids and in turn will be losing staff,” he said.

The proposed budget of $3,439,266 represents an increase of $98,389 or 2.9 percent compared with last year. The amount proposed to be raised by district taxpayers is $1,077,724, an increase of $50,355, or 4.9 percent compared with last year.

The budget includes an expenditure of $18,800, which represents the school district’s first payment to install a new roof on Mount Jefferson Junior High School in Lee. He said the total project would cost $578,000. It will be funded through the Department of Education’s Revolving Loan Program. SAD 30 taxpayers won’t have to pay back $389,000 of the loan. The remaining $189,000 will be paid back interest free during a 10-year period.

Fish said the school board at its July meeting will decide whether to proceed with the new roof project at the junior high, which is one of the district’s oldest buildings, or opt to negotiate with the state to use the state-approved junior high roof money to renovate the old portion of Lombard Elementary School in Springfield instead.

He said the district has applied for additional state revolving loan fund money to make renovations at the Lombard school.

The district is also seeking federal grants totaling $600,000 for renovations at the junior high school and the Lombard school. About half of the grant money will be used to structurally upgrade and install a new roof on the old portion of the elementary school. Also, old floor tiles will be removed and replaced with new ones.

Fish said a portion of the federal grant money would be used to remove old floor tiles at the junior high and replace them with new ones. Also, the federal grant will be used to address code and safety issues at the junior high school such as installing new classroom windows as a second means of escape in case of fire.

Fish said about $189,000 of the federal grant money will be used to pay the district’s share of the new junior high school roof project. “It would be nice to get a new roof without any burden to the taxpayer,” he said. He expects to hear whether the grants have been approved later next month.

One of the largest budget increases is for special education. Proposed is $398,155, an increase of $114,150 compared with last year. Fish said the program was not being expanded, but officials are more accurately budgeting for true costs. He said the accounts have been underbudgeted in the past.

The superintendent said the budget proposal includes about $35,000 for increased health insurance costs.

One of the largest budget decreases is in the food services accounts. Proposed is $48,499, a decrease of $58,157 compared with last year’s $106,656. Fish said in past years the food services accounts were under budgeted to a point it ran up a debt. He said last year the board appropriated a significant amount of money to help clean up the old debt. He said the old debt would be wiped out in two more years.

The budget provides funds for contractual pay increases averaging between 2 to 2.5 percent and includes funds for a few pay adjustments.

Fish said the board approved a pay adjustment for the district principal increasing the salary from $46,125 to $52,000. He said the board approved a salary of $49,500 for the special education director, who earlier earned about $41,500 while serving as the special education coordinator. He said the adjustments were made to bring the salaries more in line with regional averages.

He said the budget proposal represented a lot of hard work on the part of the board’s budget committee and the staff. He estimates that $50,000 was cut from initial budget requests.

Fish said the school district is using a new budget format called cost center format, which allows a school district to transfer only up to 5 percent between the various account lines without calling another district budget meeting.

Proposed school assessments are:

. Lee, $577,433, an increase of $32,466;

. Springfield, $217,765, an increase of $11,829;

. Webster, $60,708, a decrease of $1,907;

. Winn, $221,817, an increase of $7,966.