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School district accounting has always been confusing and there is no easy way to explain it. Just when you think you’ve got a clear picture of school district finances, the legislature changes the formulas or the way state aid is calculated and you are back to square one in your understanding of it.

I have been a school district business manager for over 25 years and some of the formula changes confuse me. I can only imagine what it is like for our legislative leaders and for the average citizen trying to make sense out of the alphabet soup of school finance.

I’d like to focus on one part of our school district’s finances – the capital outlay or operating capital portion of the general fund. The capital outlay portion was a separate fund for many years until it was folded into the general fund along with transportation in the mid 1990s.

The Minnesota Dept. of Education designated approximately $820,000 for operating capital to be used in our school district for this next school year. This is based on a formula approved by the legislature where an amount per student is designated for capital expenditures. If a district has more students, then they receive more operating capital dollars.

Capital expenditures are improvements to buildings and sites, i.e. repair or replace roofs, update heating and ventilation systems, electrical, plumbing, fire protection, lockers, elevators, windows, replacement of carpeting with epoxy floors, updating bathroom, equipment for buildings including furniture, floor scrubbers, vacuum cleaners, computers, LCS projectors, servers, phone systems, major textbook adoptions, repair of the pavement in the school’s parking lots, repair of the track at the high school, home and visitor stadium seating at the high school and improvement to the athletic fields at the middle and high schools.

As you can see, the list of capital expenditures is great. The district has already budgeted $103,000 for a major textbook adoption for science for next year with an additional $50,00 budgeted for classroom textbook purchases in other departments.

Another $150,000 will be distributed to the five buildings based on the number of students for building equipment purchases, student desks and chairs, lockers and security systems. Also, $130,000 is budgeted for technology so that the district can continue to operate its intra and internet system, update its voice mail system and keep its computers on a set rotation schedule.

Approximately $385,000 is budgeted for building improvements including poured epoxy floors in four of the buildings, mechanical upgrades, remodeling the Primary School office for better security, updating access control in all five buildings, installing a ventilation hood in the middle school industrial technology room, new bathroom partitions in the high school and middle school and pavement repair at the high schools and Taylors Falls Elementary. A portion of the roof at Taylors Falls Elementary will need to be replaced at a cost of $308,000 during the summer of 2007.

At its May 11 meeting, the Board of Education reviewed a report from Larson Engineering on proposed athletic field and site improvements at the high school. The estimated cost to repair and replace parts of the high school track (assuming soil correction is not required), install a new trench drain storm sewer system, crowd control fencing, drainage improvements in the concession building area and erosion improvements at the varsity softball field were $436,000 to $497,000. If soil correction is needed, the cost is $589,000 to $650,000. If new visitor’s bleachers, new 1,100-seat home bleachers, press box, bituminous path to visitor’s bleachers and a gravel-surfaced overflow parking area are added to the track project with soil correction, the estimated cost is $869,000 to $955,000.

Of course, the school district does not have the dollars budgeted to go ahead with projects of this magnitude at this time. However, the high school track will need to be repaired during the summer of 2007. It is almost 30 years old and the estimated life of the track was 20 years.

One of the individuals that I have worked closely with on the capital improvements that have occurred since 1999 is DeWaine Hischer, the district’s maintenance supervisor. DeWaine retired June 2 after 15 years of service with the school district.

He worked as the delivery truck driver, a substitute bus driver, a groundskeeper and was head custodian at Primary School prior to becoming the districtwide maintenance supervisor. he is a hardworking, knowledgeable, trustworthy individual that I learned a great deal from over the years. If DeWaine told me a motor needed replacing, I knew that it did since he had already tried to fix it a least once.

With his expertise, the custodial staff made the district’s buildings a pleasant environment for students and staff.

I wish DeWaine all the best in his retirement. I know that he will be traveling around in his motor home enjoying fishing with his wife, Joyce and dog, Maggie.

If there are any questions that I can answer about the capital outlay portion of the general fund or any other school finance issues, please feel free to contact me, (651) 213-2010 or via my email address at:

[email protected].

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