School Board approves $22,693,965.98 working budget

by Matt Hughes

J-E News Editor

Webster County School Board zipped through their agenda on Monday night, only getting held up by a closed session for a student disciplinary hearing that took over an hour.

One of the biggest items of the night was the introduction of the 2013-2014 working budget for the district, which board members approved with a 4-0 vote.

The approved budget reports a $22,693,965.98 balanced budget for the current school year.

One notable drop in funding was in the Support Education Excellence in Kentucky (SEEK) funds from the state. The SEEK funding program is a formula driven allocation of state provided funds to local school districts.  The formula includes funding for transportation costs and special needs students as reported by districts. Despite the fact that the district’s enrollment has remained relatively stable over the last few years, those funds continue a downward trend.

Over the last three years the district has seen SEEK funding drop from $8,660,152 in 2011, to $8,458,692 in 2012 and now to $7,921,774. In the 2009-2010 school year the district’s SEEK funding was $9,589,267.

“I’m not an accountant, but if our attendance numbers are close to even but we’ve dropped almost $2 million, something doesn’t add up,” said board chairman Jeff Pettit.

“In a district with a slowly declining enrollment, the amount you get from the state will go down,” said Superintendant Dr. James Kemp. “If you stay even, you’re going backwards.”

A review of data available from the Kentucky Department of Education shows from 2009 to 2013, the amount the state pays per pupil has shown a steady decrease, going from $4,936 to $4,412.

Changes in the items that go into the per child rate possibly reflect the downward trend. While some of the items have increased during that time, such as the amount per “at risk” child which went up by $21, others have seen noticeable cuts. 

The amount for “exceptional child”, for example, went from $894 per child in 2009 to $685 this year. That’s an automatic drop of $209 per child, which accounts for nearly a half million dollars in funding.

Another noticeable figure on the report is the amount for “Limited English Proficiency”. In 2009 the district got $13 per child. The amount has increased to $24 in 2013, but the number of students went from 67 to  121. So while the amount the district earned from the increase went up, the actual value per “Limited English Proficiency” child is roughly the same.

During that same time period the amount the district received for transportation dropped from $719,742 to  $616,804.

Despite a current enrollment of 2,154, the district’s compensation is estimated at 1,837 students. This is due in part to absenteeism and the fact that the state only counts kindergartners for half the day.

In other business, district maintenance director Dennis Parrish requested permission from the board to replace one of the district’s two mowers.

“Our oldest mower has been a good machine, but it’s getting to where it requires maintenance quite often,” he said. “When these things go down, they get expensive fast.”

The current mower, a “Grasshopper”, is a 2006 model with over 3,100 hours on it. The one Parrish requested to purchase was a John Deere 997. Wright Implement in Owensboro gave the cheapest quote, which was $13,233.79.

Parrish already has $15,000 in the budget for the mower, he just needed board approval to proceed with the purchase. The board gave it to him with a 4-0 vote.

•Chairman Pettit reported that he had been told that the soccer team said they would not be able to raise the $2,500 needed to match the board for completion of a concession stand.

The board approved a number of payments:

•$10,817.67 to architecture firm Clotfelter-Samokar for Bidding and Contracting.

•$95,011.94 to Princeton Lumber Co., Inc. for first payment on middle school constriction.

•$146,100 to TRANE for the final payment on the Energy Savings Project.

•$71,999.67 to Tremco for Middle School roof repairs, which closes out a $359,998.34 project that was approved in April 2008.