VBPS Board of Education agrees to 15% fund balance limit

The Van Buren Public Schools Board of Education on Oct. 23 unanimously approved a resolution that it wants to keep a 15% fund balance as a goal and “just spend what it takes in each year.”
School Supt. Pete Kudlak explained, in a memo, that Board Policy 3202 states that the district keep an unassigned general fund balance of at least 5% of estimated expenditures.
“We have operated all knowing that this is a bare minimum and that it is not an ideal percent to function as a school district,” he said.
“We do not increase this number in our policy because we do not ever want to find ourselves in violation of a board policy.
“We have had the conversation at board meetings that we want to keep about a 15% fund balance as a goal and then just spend what we take in each year. This is with the understanding that in any given year we might dip a little below the 15% line and in other years we will be a little higher,” he said.
“This resolution and vote memorializes this concept and direction for the district,” he said.
This action followed the auditor’s report on the 2022-23 school year that showed income of about $72 million and a fund balance of more than $12 million, which was 18%. That amounts to 32.92 days.
Auditor Laura Payne of Taylor & Morgan said if the fund balance is too high, the district has to file a spend-down plan and Supt. Kudlak said it is spending on food service to get the amount down.
Vice president Susan Featheringill said if it’s in the board policy, they are stuck with that and you can’t go below or the state will yell at them.
“There’s a fine balance between having enough and not enough,” Featheringill said.
Payne said the district was given an “unmodified opinion” in the audit, the highest they could give.
She reported the district had 4,330 students in 2022-23 and each earned $9,150 in state aid.
She said athletics is not a separate fund, but a part of the general fund and when you have a winning team it costs more. The $868,000 in expenditures includes about $700,000 beyond the revenue.
She said they are required to report the district’s $40 million in unfunded pension and health care liability.
Also, at its Oct. 23 meeting, the board:
• Heard a report from Darnell Pace, Chartwell’s Food Supervisor, and district chef Craig Ash, on the first month of their service to the district. Pace said in September 2022 there were about 365 meals served a day at BHS and in 2023 there were 1,100 and rising. He said the lunches are free now, so that should be noted. Participation is 68.52%, up from 23.07% last year. Ash said they rely on student feedback and students most enjoy the pizza. Ash said the kitchen makes 80 full pizzas each morning and they are all gone by 11:45 a.m. They told of the innovations on the menu and said they are adding parfaits for breakfast;
• Heard reports on school improvement initiatives that the Early Childhood Center (ECC) and Tyler Elementary School are working on this year. In the spring, the building staffs will follow up with how they were able to accomplish their school improvement goals or the changes that they had to make to reach their goals;
• Approved the resignations of teachers Courtney Morrison from Edgemont on Oct. 20 after less than a year of service and Kelli Kubrak from McBride on Oct. 27 after five years of service;
• Approved hiring the following non-instructional employees: Elizabeth Charlesworth as a paraprofessional and Leigh-Anne Sanders as a teacher of four-year-olds, both at ECC as of Oct. 9; Larry Francis, Jr. as a bus driver as of Oct. 18; Serena Boykin as Student Services Practitioner at Owen as of Oct. 16; and Annette Tharp as school bus aide as of Oct. 20; and
• Heard ECC paraprofessional Tonya Charlesworth say that since the ECC doesn’t have bus service for students, some 120 families have to drive their students to school and that leaves the 60 to 75 ECC employees unable to use the hard-surface parking lot. They have to park in a rocky field that has damaged cars. They were told they could park in the staff parking lot, two lots away and without a sidewalk to their location. Weather is getting bad, she said, and employees have to bring dry shoes to wear inside the school after the long trek through mud and wet grass from the staff parking area. She said she is speaking for many employees. They had been promised gravel in the field, but there is none yet and they wonder how the district will snow-blow the gravel. Board president Amy Pearce thanked her for coming to the board and told her the principal and superintendent will let her know what will be done.