Schools Come in with Flat Budget Despite Deep State Cuts
The Jefferson County Department of Education will turn in a balanced budget document for the fiscal year 2017/2018 despite deep cuts in BEP funding from the State of Tennessee. For the upcoming fiscal year, Jefferson County will lose more than three quarters of a million dollars in funding due to a new criteria from the State that takes its numbers from students who receive food stamps. Historically, the State has used a formula that funds by numbers of free and reduced lunch students, which out number the total of students that receive food stamps. This change in formula, in combination with a slight betterment of economic position of Jefferson County, resulted in a total reduction of State and Federal Funding in excess of $1.1 million dollars. Jefferson County Finance Director Potts stated that the Department of Education had worked diligently at coming in with a flat budget, as was requested by the Jefferson County Commission, and with the use of some excess BEP funds for the current fiscal year, the DOE has done what the County Commission requested.
School Board Member Bradley stated that he would like to hold the budget vote until any requests from the collaborative conferencing effort could be received. Central Office Director Finchum said that the only request that would require funding was already a part of the proposed budget. Director of Schools Edmonds said “ The Budget is on the County Commission’s schedule and it is due to them. I really believe that we need to pass this budget so that it is ready to go before the budget committee on time.” Director Edmonds went on to say that it had been a difficult budget year due to the extreme cuts but the staff and Director of Finance Potts, as well as Edmonds, worked hard at meeting the County Commission request. The General (Solomon/Jarnigan), Federal (Jarnigan/Cox) and Food Services (Cox/Fair) budgets for fiscal year 2017/2018 were all approved 6-0 (Board Member Potts Absent).
In other action, the Board approved a mandated increase of ten cents per meal for students (Fair No) and approved some general housekeeping budget amendments. With a motion from Jarnigan and 2nd from Solomon, the Board approved $51,000 left over from the purchase of a lift system for Jefferson County High School, which came in at $114,000 rather than the budgeted $165,000, to go toward the replacement of the concrete gym floor at White Pine School. With previously allocated funds and contributions from the White Pine PTO fund raising effort the $51,000 should be enough to complete the funding of the gym floor. The Board also unanimously approved the transfer of a school bus (not functional for school system use) to the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department. Tenure of a few teachers that were inadvertently left off the tenure list were approved, as well as the textbook adoption and TSBA 2018 Membership Dues.
Board Members received an update on the bat issue at Maury Middle School from Department of Education Facilities Director Phagan. He stated that work is ongoing to rid the school of bats and that it is being checked daily. Some work will be done after the close of school to insure that bats are not trapped and dying inside the building while school is still in session. At the request of the Board, he will check with TWRA to see if they can assist. Teachers of the Year were presented, as well as SCOPE participants. The JCHS Patriot Cafe was highlighted as an area of special focus for the April 27, 2017 meeting, with Richie Greene making the presentation to the Board.
