BY AMY FLOWERS UMBLE
The King George County School Board has whittled its budget shortfall to about $140,000, down from $400,000.
And Tuesday night, board members will make their case to the county’s Board of Supervisors about why they need help making ends meet—and why they need nearly $4 million more for next year.
The School Board announced early this month that expected teachers’ raises would be put on hold while the schools tried to deal with budget issues.
The gap came from three main areas:
A lower-than-expected daily attendance rate.
Increases in transportation costs.
Increases in special-education costs.
King George schools get about $4,000 per student from the state, based on the average daily attendance. So when fewer students showed up for classes, the state provided less money.
The King George Board of Supervisors expressed a willingness to help with this year’s shortfall, but first demanded a more detailed account of the budget.
Monday night, the School Board met and reviewed both this year’s budget gap and next year’s requests for money, trying to see where cuts could be made. And they tried to determine the best way to make their point to supervisors.
“It’s important that they understand the difficulty we’re in as clearly as possible,” School Board member Ken Novell said.
Officials from the special-education and transportation departments explained why costs had risen so dramatically this year.
Paying for private speech therapists drove the special-education budget up more than 400 percent.
In this year’s budget, some activity bus routes weren’t included. But school personnel were told to continue providing transportation for those after-school activities.
Plus, more drivers and monitors opted to use the schools’ health insurance.
And then a grant that paid to transport homeless students living in other counties dried up. Under federal law, schools have to provide transportation for homeless students even if they live out of the district.
Usually, budgets have a bit of padding to account for such fluctuations, interim Superintendent Stanley Jones said. But this year’s budgets included so many cuts that even the small increases pack a powerful punch.
“When you cut the school system to bare bones, it will never work,” Jones said. “When you’re dealing with children, things will always change.”
School Board members said their biggest priority for the meeting Tuesday night is to get the $216,902 needed to reinstate raises that teachers expected to see this month.
The two boards will also discuss the next school year’s budget. Jones is requesting about $16 million from the Board of Supervisors, an increase of nearly $4 million over this year’s allotment of county money.
The largest driving force in the request for more money comes from rising employee benefit costs, to the tune of $1.5 million.
King George schools will also lose about $900,000 in stimulus funds in the next school year. Plus, the division plans to open a Commonwealth Governor’s School site, which would cost $156,856 for the first year.
The School Board members scoured a list of items that could be deleted from the next budget, but had a hard time committing to taking much out of the fiscal plan.
Proposed cuts included new textbooks, laptops for high school students, football helmets and library equipment. Members agreed to cut the library equipment but balked at most of the other cuts.
Amy Flowers Umble: 540/735-1973 aumble@freelancestar.com
