School Board to vote on FY 2023 budget Monday

The Mahomet-Seymour School Board will take a vote on the proposed FY 2023 budget during a regular board meeting on Sept. 19. 

District staff projects revenue to be $45,066,083 with expenditures at $44,979,032. The district expects to have a $13,558,918 balance by Sept. 2023. 

The district accounted for nearly $1.7 mil. in additional expenditures in the education fund; $19,000 more in operation/building/maintenance; $50,000 more in municipal retirement and social security; $186,000 more in the site and construction fund and $46,000 more in the tort fund. Each of those funds also saw a similar increase in revenues from the FY 2022 budget. 

The district has budgeted for about $162,000 from the fire/safety fund; $51,000 in transportation and $125,000 from the bond and interest funds. The bond and interest fund is projected to end with a negative balance ($138,430) as is working cash ($185,662) and tort ($3,078).

Because the district is still negotiating with the Mahomet-Seymour Education Association, the district’s numbers for certified and non-certified staff are based on the district’s Sept. 2 offer of 4.25-percent annual increases for all certified staff and 5.29-percent to 7.0-percent increases for all non-certified staff over the four-year term. The union is asking for 5-percent for certified staff over four years and $1.50 per hour increases for all non-certified staff annually. 

Part of the issue with the contract negotiations is the salary schedule, which has not been updated for at least a decade. Typically, staff is offered a percentage raise that can vary for employees based on where they are on the schedule; this year teachers are looking for a flat percentage that is applied evenly across all steps of the schedule. 

Another issue is the desire to increase the base pay for first-year teachers so the district will be more competitive when making new hires. To address this, the district proposes what they call a “double-step” which will, in effect, move the salary offered to first-year teachers up one ‘step’ each year for the four years of the contract and also reduce the number of steps in the schedule by removing the last step from the schedule each year.  

Smith said that once an agreement is reached, the following years could be time for that schedule to be updated, accounting for inflation and other factors. 

The two parties are expected to meet again on Sept. 20.

Since 2019 some board members have asked for a more detailed report of revenues and expenditures prior to voting to approve the budget. That document was provided to the board on Wednesday.

The district received an unexpected $1,480,045.5 mil. In Evidence Based Funding from the state this year. Smith said the district plans to spend 99-percent of that on staff. The district has also used some of its ESSER funds to hire additional staff, including a Pre-K teacher, a psychologist, Jr. High Assistant Principal and a Family Engagement Specialist.

Because the district can count on the distributed EBF funding year-after-year, it is typically used towards recurring expenses, like salaries, whether it is an increase in salary or hiring new positions, which the district often needs to do because of increasing enrollment. Mahomet-Seymour’s current enrollment is 3,439 students (Middletown Prairie Elementary: 817, Lincoln Trail Elementary: 793,Mahomet-Seymour Junior High: 816, Mahomet-Seymour High School: 1013). 

Still, other sources of revenue, like ESSER funding or federal funding for free lunches and breakfast during COVID mitigations are no longer available to the district annually. Smith said that some of the big swings in the budget this year can be attributed to grants or special funding that were available and will not be available this year. 

While developing the budget, Smith guesses on some of the revenue, like with revenues from property taxes. The Champaign County Clerk’s office has assessed property in Mahomet-Seymour at 2.61-percent growth, which is lower than the average over the last decade. Smith believed growth would be more like 5-percent. 

The district levies for the highest amount that it can each year in order to capture all of the tax revenue that it can. Typically, property owners will not see their tax rate increase or decrease much without a successful referendum. Mahomet-Seymour has one of the lowest tax rates in Champaign County, but the highest median property value. 

That rate can change without a referendum, though, through TORT, a fund used to pay a variety of liability-related expenses, such as legal fees, insurance premiums and worker’s compensation claims. Over the last five years, Mahomet-Seymour has seen significant increases in legal fees, which can be paid through TORT. To remedy taxpayers not seeing an increase there, Smith said some partial salaries that are being currently paid using TORT funds can be eliminated from that “bucket” to keep the tax rate the same. 

She said the planning process occurs throughout the year. For example, building administrators are thinking about staffing based on projections for the 2023-24 school year. According to Smith, not every building gets what they want or need, but it’s a starting point. Additionally, as she prepares each budget, Smith said she allocates certain dollars to each school based on enrollment numbers, and has building administrators or athletic directors allocate dollars based on what is mandated by law and what each department needs at that time. 

The district has seen an increase of sales tax, a fund only to be used for facility upgrades, in recent years. Smith said she would like to wait and see if that trend will continue. Likely, the increase is due to online sales tax dollars being included in the amount each school in Champaign County receives. 

Smith said allocation of those dollars has not been discussed other than going towards bond payments that are due. Planning for future projects is dependent upon the Nov. 8 referendum vote, according to Smith.

Budgeted numbers are just projections, though, Chief School Business Official Heather Smith said. It’s the expenditures that really matter. 

In reviewing the document provided to the board, expenditures do not always meet the budgeted amount. In cases where the total expense for a line item is less than budgeted, Smith said that money can be reallocated to another part of the budget within the same category where an expense goes over the projected expenditures. With this method, Smith said she begins each year with every line item zeroed-out. 

The following documents were provided by the district. The first pdf is the budget proposal in the Sept. 19 board packet. The second sheet is the revenue and expense projection Smith provided the board mid-week. The third document is a breakdown of what was spent from the account designated for the board of education in 2021-22.