NEWBERRY — The Newberry County School District Board of Trustees has passed the second and final reading of the Fiscal Year 2019-20 budget; with expenditures at $58,922,700 and revenue at $59,222,567 — for a positive difference of $299,867.
Susan Dowd, chief financial officer for the Newberry County School District, said she made some increases on the revenue side to account for the reassessment year.
“We did increase the current taxes for operation; historically, what I do for next year’s budget, I look at what we’ve collected for this year and go ahead and project that as collections for next year as well. As we had conversations during the public hearing, we talked about reassessment; a lot of times reassessment is going to bring in additional revenue,” Dowd said. “What I have done, basically for current taxes for operations this year, we’ve already collected $16,590,000, I have added an additional $300,000 there because, in essence, when you go through reassessment you do get an additional amount of money.”
Dowd also said that they still do not know what that additional amount of money is going to be at this time, and they only know what the District’s needs are at this time. With that in mind, she increased current taxes for operations to $16,890,000 for 2019-20.
When it comes to delinquent taxes, Dowd said they’ve already collected $680,000; and revenue in lieu they have collected more than $2,568,000 — which is what she has projected. However, she said she reduced the collection to account for the revenue they will lose — an estimated $108,000 — due to the Oscar Mayer agreement that will no longer be in effect.
Those were the changes from previous revenue projections that Dowd reported, with the other projections staying the same. Dowd further stated that over the last 10 years the School Board has only gone up two mills.
Dowd also reported that no additional millage has been added for this year’s budget.
This has the FY 2019-20 revenue at $59,222,567 — an increase of $3,192,166 over last year’s budget.
On the expenditure side, there were no changes reported from the previous meeting. Some of the highlights of expenditures include $50,000 for one full-time employee in certified positions based on classroom enrollment projections, Dowd said this position would be for Gallman Elementary School; $420,000 for seven reading recovery teachers; $1,339,029 for a four percent cost of living increase for certified teacher personnel; and $114,269 for a one percent cost of living increase for all other District staff, with the exception of nurses who are required to get the same four percent increase as certified personnel.
The FY 2019-20 budget was approved after Boardmember Ike Bledsoe made a motion and Boardmember Clyde Hill seconded.
In other business, the Office of Finance was recognized for two recent awards. The first was the Association of School Business Officials International’s Certificate of Excellence in Financial Reporting.
“This award, the highest recognition for school district financial operations offered by ASBO, is only conferred to school systems that have met or exceeded the standards for the program. It confirms the school business office’s commitment to financial accountability and transparency. This validates the credibility of our school system’s operations, measuring the integrity and technical competence of our business staff. The District has received this award for 21 consecutive years,” said Pam Arrington executive director of Human Resources for the District.
The Office of Finance was also awarded a Certificate of Achievement for Excellence in Financial Reporting.
“This award is presented by the Government Finance Officers Association of the United States and Canada for its Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR). The CAFR has been judged by an impartial panel to meet the high standards of the program including demonstrating a constructive spirit of full disclosure to clearly communicate its financial story. This certificate of achievement is the highest form of recognition in the area of governmental accounting and financial reporting,” Arrington said.