In most conversation circles around the state of Kansas, there are ploys used to get a discussion started. Farmers will compare amounts of rainfall to the exact hundredth of an inch to see who got the most. Sports fans will make optimistic statements like, “This could be our year.” And even when it appears there’s nothing to talk about, we can always make a comment like, “How’s it going?” to whomever will listen.

Kansas educators’ conversations start a little differently these days. Lately, when I meet a colleague, I introduce myself, tell them where I’m from, and then ask, “How much money was cut from your district’s budget this year?” If that doesn’t get the ball rolling, others will ask what our district will have to cut, or if we can keep the doors open until the end of the year. Compelling conversation? I’d rather talk about the Royals or the great rains we’ve had this spring…

Since I brought up the topic of budget, let’s delve into my first year with our school district’s budget. This school year started with promise, as most school years did. Kids were excited to return, and staff was ready to get to work with them. But financially, we were sitting in good shape to rebound from a couple of difficult years of overspending. We had increased enrollment working for us, higher assessed valuation on our side, and even some state aid from Topeka (to the tune of $272,000), allowing us to give local taxpayers a break in their contribution to the Local Option Budget. We even heard Governor Brownback tell us that he would protect education in his election campaign if he were reelected. It seems like I remember him saying that education and the students of Kansas had suffered enough…

Then, in a State of the State address for the ages, we heard those resounding, daunting, and even accusatory words from the governor. “Kansas has a spending problem and education is to blame. Let me repeat that…” you know the rest… The proverbial carpet had officially been pulled out from beneath us.

A closer look at the meaning of “spending problem and education is to blame,” gets interesting. If you look at USD 466’s budget, you’ll see that the state’s contribution to our budget did go up. But please DO NOT confuse this statement with thinking that our district got more money than it should have. That’s a completely different statement.

Here’s what happened. Our budget allows us to have $6 Million in our General Fund. This money comes from the state’s Base State Aid per Pupil (BSAPP) as well as weightings we are allowed for the classes our students take and the situation our kids’ families are in. We also receive $2 Million in Local Option Budget (LOB). LOB money is generated by Scott County residents paying local taxes. Our school district taxes 30% of the general fund to help with yearly costs. I’ll come back to the Local Option Budget shortly, as this is the fund that is so deceiving. The Capital Outlay fund this year allowed us to generate about $750,000 to take care of maintenance needs in the district. Capital Outlay also comes from local tax dollars. These three funds are the majority of our budget. These are in question as we attempt to put our students on the path to success.

Let’s look at the Local Option Budget a little closer. Remember the statement made earlier that Kansas has a spending problem. The governor claims that the legislature put more money into education this year than ever before. If we look at the LOB, the state gave us $272,000 in LOB state aid. Remember that we can only generate 30% of our General Fund. This means that we didn’t get any more money in LOB, we were simply able to levy less mills to reach our maximum budget authority. More money was provided by the state, but it was done in a manner that kept local tax payers from having to pay it themselves. The $272,000 helped us get to the $2 Million cap. In the end, our district did NOT get anything more funding than it would have. We just received our dollars from a different place.

Not only did this message blur the picture for tax payers by falsely claiming school districts have more cash flow, the state then took some of the money back. They took away some of the money we were promised would help local taxpayers. Had we rejected the money in August and told them, “We’ll just take this out of our local pocketbooks instead,” we would have been better off! 

Working in our favor this year was increased enrollment and an excess payment the state won’t require us to pay back. Due to these two things happening, our budget basically breaks even with what we originally anticipated. But we can’t overlook the fact that we could have had an excess of $76,000, due to our increase in enrollment, to answer a lot of budget questions (adding back staff, improving curriculum, etc.)

As we move into the next budget year, it sounds like we’ll be working with the same money we had last year. This is the philosophy of Block Grants. Early indications are that our enrollment with be slightly up. The formula we’ve used in the past to figure school funding would have provided more finances for us to hire staff, purchase curriculum and technology, and purchase capital items (furniture, vehicles, etc.) when enrollment increases. But our reality is that we will have to work within the means we had when enrollment was lower. Once we get our final count in September or 2015, it’ll be interesting to see what the true impact this legislative session had on us.

We have heard from the governor and his followers that “times are tough,” and we need to make adjustments to get ourselves out of this recession. This recession was self-imposed by those outside of education. USD 466 didn’t ask for this, but we are dealing with it. Let’s just hope that Year Two isn’t as dramatic.