Your Taxpayers’ Association recently met with the School Superintendent, a Board Member and Staff on a number of issues including the School Board’s FY2008 budget and student count. We were told our contention that the budget is “$330+ million” and students “will total 300 less than their original estimated increase” was incorrect. The real issue appeared to be how each of us calculated our answers given the very complicated State mandated “accounting” system. We declined to retract our comments, but offered to let school staff write a clarification for our readers, which follows exactly as written:
“…..Chapter 200, Florida Statutes, Truth in Millage, (TRIM) has specific requirements for advertising government budgets. The (School) Board advertises in compliance with this statute.
The financial records of the Board are organized on the basis of funds, each of which is considered a separate accounting entity. The Boards resources are allocated to, and accounted for, in individual funds based on the purpose for which they are to be spent.
The General fund provides for the day-to-day operations of the Schools. Total revenue budget for the General fund is advertised at $146.7 million. A fund balance in the General fund consists of unexpended programs at year-end required to be carried forward to the next year for their specific purpose and a 5.0 percent reserve required by Board Policy. Salary and benefits make up 84.0 percent of the budget for this fund, with the remainder used for services, utilities, supplies, and miscellaneous.
The Special Revenue fund consists of Federal Grant awards to be used for the awarded purpose. Unexpended amounts are usually returned at end of the school year. The school food service fund is also accounted for here as it is regulated closely by the USDA Department of Agriculture Food and Nutrition Management and it receives $2.9 million for the free and reduced lunch program including commodities. The total revenue budget advertised for this fund is $15.5 million
The Board’s Debt Service fund is used solely to retire annual principal and interest payments on outstanding debt. The District makes payments on the Certificate of Participation (COP) Notes issued to build Dr. David A. Anderson Middle School and State Board of Education Bonds (SBE) issued on behalf of the District. The COP payments are made from revenue transferred from the Capital fund. Revenue received from the State for the Board’s share of license plate sales make payments on the SBE Bonds. The fund’s revenue budget advertised for this fund is $2.7 million.
The Capital Projects fund accounts for the resources generated by the local capital improvement tax levy to be used for educational capital outlay needs, including new construction, renovation and remodeling projects, maintenance, repairs and site improvements. Other resources are generated by class size reduction construction funding, impact fees, and fuel tax rebates. The Capital Projects revenue budget advertised for this fund is $64.0 million with capital projects encumbered or earmarked at the end of the year of $91.6 million.
We understand that even though the total advertised budget is $337 million, total revenue for all funds was budgeted at $227.6 million. Transfers between funds cannot be counted as revenue because they are included in one fund as revenue and then transferred to another. The fund balance consists of reserves for specific items and is not free to be used for new projects.”
The meeting also included a better understanding of how enrolled students are funded and the confusion between full time equivalent students (FTE) and the number of enrolled students at any given time. Many students do not come to class during the first week of school but, begin to enroll later, after the Labor Day weekend. Therefore, at the 10 day count, enrollment is normally lower. Student surveys taken in October and February each school year are used to calculate the District’s operating funds. Students not in attendance during the survey weeks are not funded. Therefore, it is entirely possible that several students are not funded even though they may attend at certain times during the year. The number of FTE for this school year is 17,703 down from last year by 124. This year is the first time the District has experienced declining enrollment in many years.”
The MCTA board appreciates the clarification and the continuing opportunity to work with district personnel on interpreting budgets, televising meetings and workshops, controlling construction and maintenance costs, and reducing personnel expenses.
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We get letters, lots of letters, most by email to: admin@mctaxpayers.org or sent to individual members (listed on http://www.mctaxpayers.org/) of our Board of Directors. We take this as a strong indication of the growing frustration our members and readers have with the spending practices and priorities of our local governments and schools. We appreciate the interest and information most letters provide, but it is impossible for our limited number of volunteers to respond directly to each one. However, we encourage this correspondence and assure those writing that every letter is read and passed along to all members of our Board. Many become reference material and provide information for our columns and member’s Newsletter.
Over the years we have tried to respond by mirroring the issues of those that spend the time to contact us. From our growing membership, increasingly positive correspondence and validation of many of our positions by civic and government leaders, it appears that we are making our members' concerns known. It also appears that at least some of our elected officials are getting the message and starting to re-consider their attitudes toward those concerns. .
In short, until individual School Board, City and County Commission officials change their attitudes toward spending your money and find the political courage to honestly address the underlying causes, there is little hope for lasting change. Only continued and concerted action by our organization, other civic-minded groups, and individuals such as those writing us, can really make a difference. To those writers: please make your concerns known to your Commissioners and School Board Members as well as MCTA. If you desire and indicate approval, we will help by forwarding your correspondence, along with the comments that we regularly offer, to the appropriate officials. We will not advance blatantly political or vicious correspondence. If you would rather not have your identity publicly disclosed please put "withhold name" on your letter or e-mail and we will delete any identifying references prior to forwarding.