By SCOTT REESE WILLEY

Hometown Press

East Chambers school board trustees got their first look at the school district’s proposed 2010-11 budget last Thursday.

The spending plan, still in its rough draft form, predicted the school district would take in about $10.9 million in local and state revenue and calls for expenditures of $11,380,342.

The budget proposals include a “wish-list” of items that department heads would like to see included in the upcoming budget.

“There will be considerable fine tuning before adoption,” said Superintendent of schools Scott Campbell. “This is just the first run; nothing is cut so you can see what everybody asked for . . . in a perfect world” where money is plentiful.

The general fund, which is made up of local tax dollars and state contributions, is predicted to be about $10.9 million. Expenditures are expected to be around $11,380,342.

Trustees spent about an hour last Thursday reviewing the budget requests associated with the general fund. 

The 2010-11 budget also will include federal money but it is earmarked for specific programs and trustees have little say over how that money is spent.

Campbell did warn the board that some of the programs are funded through federal stimulus money, which may not be available this coming school year.

Campbell shared good news with trustees: property values in the school district have increased by an estimated $6 million over last year, which means more property tax revenue for education. 

Additionally, East Chambers ISD stands to receive an estimated $400,000 through the Chambers County Equalization Fund, which ensures that local school districts receive generally the same amount of funding for education.

Campbell said he the equalization fund "is important to our revenue stream.

"ECISD should receive an additional $200,000 in revenue this year than it did last year, Campbell told the board.

The additional revenue will come in handy because trustees are considering giving employees a 3 percent pay raise this coming school year, Campbell reminded the board.Actually, he noted, some employees will get a little under 2.5 percent of an increase and other employees will get slightly more than 2.5 percent of an increase, he added.

But, generally, the salary increase is going to be about 3 percent, he said.The rough budget calls for the school district to spend about $5.1 million on salaries over the next 12 months, an increase of 3.67 percent over last year.Some of the other budget requests that will increase the general fund include more pay for the band director.

Campbell said the band director, who presently earns about $138,000, would receive $154,000 because the band director's duties have increased.Other increases in the general fund include a proposed 7 percent increase in supplies, 3 percent increase in the library fund, a 4 percent increase in principals office needs, 5 percent increase in health services, and a 22 percent increase in transportation costs. The transportation department is purchasing a new $99,000 bus to add to the bus fleet.

The proposed increase would boost the transportation department's budget from $457,000 to $559,000.   

Extracurricular activities, such as athletics, cheerleading, and academic competition is expected to increase from $559,000 to $593,000, or by 6 percent. Campbell said such activities are "critically important" to education. Much of the increase is due to the success ECISD has in extracurricular activities, he noted. When kids when, they often have to travel to competition elsewhere in the state, he added."Our success is a wonderful thing but it comes with a cost. We send a lot of kids around the state. It's a hefty cost," he said.

The proposed budget calls for the central administration department budget — the school board, administration building and superintendent's office — to increase from $438,000 to $451,000, or 3 percent, next school year. 

Maintenance and operations of the school district would increase from $1,650,000 to $1,844,000, or 16 percent if trustees adopt the proposed budget.

The first draft of the budget also calls for purchasing new data entry software and data processing employee, and $700,000 for capital improvement projects.

Campbell told trustees they could always cut out some of the proposed capital improvement projects if they wished and they would be included in following budgets or taken out of the school district's $4.17 million fund balance.

He cautioned the board that the state may cut back on school district allocations because many school districts have excessive fund balances. He said the state is facing its own revenue shortfall of $18 billion and legislators could decide to cut off revenue to those school districts who have excessive fund balances. Campbell said ECISD might be better off spending some of its fund balance on the capital improvement projects so as not to affect its state allocation.

"Everyone I've talked to (in education circles) has said they plan to adopt pretty significant deficit budgets to eat into their (excessive) fund balances," he said.Even though the proposed general revenue budget presently calls for spending $500,000 more than the school district will receive in revenue — which makes it a deficit budget —  Campbell assured the board that they had plenty of time to "fine tune" the proposed spending plan and he encouraged them to contact him personally if they had any questions."We will trim where we can," he said.

Fortunately, the portion of the budget that pays off long term debt is expected to decrease this coming school year because ECISD qualified for state capital improvement grants."It's a pretty decent budget; it's shaping up," he said of the rough draft outlined last week.In other action last week, the board re-elected James Gibson as board president and elected Gary Hoffpauir as board vice president. Angela Zbranek was elected secretary of the board.

Recently, the board voted unanimously to keep cafeteria prices the same as last year.They are as follows:Breakfast (All campuses): Full Pay Students $1.25; Reduced Meal Students 30¢; Teachers and district staff $1.75; Visitors $2.25; Ala cart or extra entrees will be priced according to cost of product. Lunch Elementary: Full Pay Students $1.75; Reduced Meal Students 40¢; Teachers and district staff $2.50; Visitors $3.00. Lunch Secondary Full Pay Students $2.00; Reduced Meal Students 40¢; Teachers and district staff $2.50 Visitors $3.50; Ala cart, extra entrees and snack bar items will be priced according to cost of product. Milk 50¢