FBS: Deficit Spending May Become Reality For The First Time In FBISD

FBISD dilemma: raises and deficit
budget or balanced budget and no raises

By Barbara Fulenwider
The Fort Bend ISD board is between a rock and a hard place. They can adopt a balanced budget that includes no raises or much staffing beyond campuses or give employee raises and adopt a deficit budget.

The superintendent of another school district, faced with a similar scenario, said it’s a problem 50 percent of Texas districts are facing this year thanks to legislators having changed the school funding formula two years ago. While the state’s public school districts are pinched, the state has a big bankroll this year.

So with having to operate with $465 million, the same amount of dollars as last year, while needing more staff for two new schools and paying increased fuel prices, the district’s Chief Financial Officer Mike Seale presented the board with three options on raises.

The first is a one percent raise for all employees and a projected budgeted deficit of $1,057,700; the second is a two percent raise with a deficit of $5,605,900; the third is a three percent raise and a projected budgeted deficit of $9,251,100. Seale said staff has “not made a recommendation to the board” regarding the three options.

He pointed to the fact that Cypress-Fairbanks school district “is cutting staff and freezing salaries” and the “Alief is giving a big raise but preparing to go into their fund balance between $20 to $25 million.”

What the board is wrestling with, Seale said, “is making sure they give teachers and the rest of staff the largest possible raise and still be fiscally responsible.”. . . (get the full story at http://www.fortbendstar.com/080608/n_FBISD%20dilemma%20raises%20and%20deficit%20budget%20or%20balanced%20budget%20and%20no%20raises.htm)