Austin public school officials believed they’ve lived up to a promise.

Wednesday, August 18, 1999

Austin public school officials believed they’ve lived up to a promise. That’s why they have no problem asking the voters for another chance to prove themselves.

Today at 4 p.m. the Austin Board of Education will meet at Ellis Middle School to vote on the precise language of a Nov. 2 levy referendum ballot.

The district is proposing a levy override of $1.6 million for each of the next 10 years, beginning in 2001. The previous five-year override expires with the 2000 taxes. When voters passed that referendum ($1.29 million annually over five years) in 1995, school officials made what amounted to a promise.

"One important thing we did with the last referendum was reduce class size," said Al Eckmann, director of business management services. "It’s what we said we would do."

"The ratios in the lower grades are just outstanding," said financial accountant Lori Volz.

That’s precisely why the override is used.

"You have levy overrides for a couple of reasons," Volz said. "One is to get funds to provide educational programs."

The other is to tap into a funding resource that Volz, Eckmann and others see as hard to pass up. The state refunds 68 percent of the district’s levy override – called referendum aid – leaving the district’s voters to pay for 32¢ on the dollar.

If the proposed levy of $1.6 million annually passes, taxpayers will be on the hook for $608,000 annually, or 32 percent of a $1.9 million annual levy override. That $1.9 million would include an existing $300,000 annual levy override that expires in 2007.

Volz said the levy override would mean a mere one-tenth percent increase in taxes for the average taxpayer.

The levy override would be just a small percentage of the school’s general fund budget, now forecast at $36.7 million for 1999-00.

Volz and Eckmann agreed that one way the levy override money could be used is to fund staff development.

Last year, the district received $481,000 in state funding for help in implementing the state’s new graduation standards. Some of that money was targeted for staff development, an allowable use of the money. But the money came from a two-year "sunset fund" that began in 1997-98, said Volz, meaning the money won’t be coming in this year. That loss somewhat negates the increase – a 5 percent rise in the state aid formula in 1999-00 – in overall state funding. Volz said money from the levy override could be used to replace the lost grad standards funding. As of right now, the district has already scheduled four half-days of teacher in-service dedicated to a new writing emphasis called "Writing to Learn." All of the district’s 310 teachers will participate.

All told, Austin Public Schools are expected to receive $15.9 million from the state this year, an increase of $1.2 over 1998-99. But in the preliminary budget passed in June, the budget reflects only an $800,000 increase from the state, not $1.2 million.

That’s just to be safe, said Eckmann. After all of the district’s K-12 students are tallied – enrollment is at the basis of the state aid formula – administrators will present a revised budget in the fall, when they hope to include the entire $1.2 million.

"The preliminary budget is based on projections," said Volz, who added the district moved up this week’s high school and elementary school registration so it could get an early handle on student population. "We took a conservative look at enrollment."

"The reason we’re conservative," Eckmann said, "is because enrollment has stalled. But the (annual) increase in elementary students has offset the (annual) decrease in the high school."

There are fewer high school students for a variety of reasons. The school does not get state aide for a student who has elected to attend post-secondary classes at, say, Riverland Community College. It also doesn’t get funding credit for dropouts.

Also at today’s meeting:

– The school board will vote on the plans to renovate Wescott Field. If the board passes the $3.8 million plans, a steering committee will be convened to begin a community-wide fundraising effort for the project.