Questions from Budget Public Hearing
The following questions were from the district's public hearing. Responses below are from the district's Assistant Superintendent for Finance - Kimberly Rohring
Do any of the surpluses from last year have any benefit in this year’s proposed budget?
Revenue decisions are made by the Acting Superintendent and Board Of Education (BOE). The proposed budget includes use of appropriated fund balance ($8M), which is in excess of the amount stated to be used at the January 28th BOE meeting ($3.7M). The budget is "adopted" once the community approves it or the BOE adopts a contingent budget.
Last year our tax levy was increased by roughly 10% to cover a gap as I know it due to a delay in state aid. I think the question was asked earlier: is that surplus a part of this budget?
The money that was raised above and beyond form what the state gave us, is that included in this budget. I believe that is the case. My question is how is that raised tax levy in the budget but it begs the question that if taxes were raised by mistake because of a gap and timing of state aid why have the taxes not going down. Why is this budget not if this is a cost savings board right that the majority here is to save taxpayers money to prevent further increases if there was a mistake with our gap or some timing issue why has that not taken into consideration when this budget was put together and why the taxes not going down this year that’s my question. The Board of Education determines any tax levy increase and proposes such to the community. The revote occurred after the May 2024 annual budget vote because a revised budget was proposed to the community in June 2024. These amounts are not correct. Please see the Budget Hearing presentation of 5/13/25 clearly noting a tax levy increase of less than 2.5% in FY25. The proposed annual increase in spending for FY26 is more than $20M supported by BOE approved use of appropriated fund balance and restricted reserves.
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