Lisbon business manager Laurie Maher said the school’s funds are in a healthy condition, despite some changes from previous years.
One of the areas that has had a decrease this year has been the district’s unspent balance.
“That’s because we’ve had an influx of funding and spending from ESSER III (Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief III) funds in our budgets,” Maher said. “We business managers have known those funds would impact our budgets eventually, and this is when that’s hit.”
The school’s solvency ratio also dropped from 18 percent to 12 percent this year, which Maher noted wasn’t a huge surprise.
“I could definitely see that fund bouncing back next year,” Maher said. “Part of the impact to us is we’ve been adding new staff and programs, which increases expenditures.”
Solvency ratio is an indicator of the cash a district has in the bank and how long they could operate if they closed their doors. The district likes to keep at a 15 percent ratio. Unspent balance is the money that resides in the bank, and a healthy range for that fund is in the 10 to 12 percent ratio.
“I worry more about the unspent balance, as that is better to be a little higher,” Maher said. “We’re not a bank, however, and so we don’t want to tax and hold on to money, we want the money we’re receiving to be going to students and the school.”
Certified enrollment was up last year, which helped the budget, as did not having a huge open enrollment decline.
“Having that in the positive, even if it’s just by one or two students, makes a huge difference on the district’s bottom line,” Maher said.
School board member Robyn Richey asked if the funds might bounce back by next year, and Maher said that is a strong possibility.
“We had a deficit in our special education balance that went from $215,000 last year to a deficit of roughly $89,000 this year,” Maher said. “That’s a $126,000 swing in our budget we hadn’t anticipated and definitely impacted our solvency ratio. That could be higher again next year.”