Reports: CISD showing improvement

By Taylor Short/reporter3@trcle.com

The Cleburne ISD board received its’s 12th monthly report on it’s progress on the Texas Education Agency’s corrective action plan at Monday night’s meeting, with Texas Education Agency monitor Dr. Monte Geren reporting far more improvements than unchanged issues.

In his September report, Geren first noted the 52 training activities in the district, which he said is “indicative of the effort being put into the training with the district.”

“Improvements were observable in nearly every area of business and financial operation, that demonstrate the district’s continued effort to comply with the action plan, which was submitted to the TEA,” Geren said. “There’s going to be some things that are going to take more time than I had, and these are based on my observations today.”

Geren recognized 15 major accomplishments completed by the district:

zx The “high-risk grantee” status and the hold status for the district’s notices of grant award were removed in January.

zx The elimination of the federal and state grant reimbursement backlog, facilitated reimbursement for 30 to 60 days.

zx Development of a “Cleburne ISD Fiscal Manual.”

zx Policy and procedural reviews and updates concerning personnel and payroll.

zx Changes that comply with the Fair Labor Standards Act.

zx Hiring a new superintendent and his work to reorganize the administration.

zx Work on the 2008-09 budget, including the selection of an independent auditing firm.

zx Implementation of five of the seven recommendations by the monitor.

zx Comprehensive and ongoing training of district personnel.

zx Review of allegations of illegal acts for district attorney.

zx Good review from U.S. Department of Education auditor.

zx Payment of bonded indebtedness to save about $462,000

zx Creation of a student and co-curricular accounting activity manual

zx New procedures for documenting cash receipts

zx A positive compliance review from the TEA monitor.

Geren also noted issues that require continued monitoring, including the development of an action plan based on a facility study by the district’s consultant and several issues regarding the general fund balance and use of funds based on enrollment and attendance.

“It’s no secret that our budget is very tight this year, and one of the reasons is because of the way the state chose to fund those and transfer some of the basic operating expenses that the school districts in the state of Texas have received to the federal program,” said Dr. Ronny Beard, CISD superintendent.

What this does, Beard said, is reduce the amount of funds the district has to operate the schools and replaces that with federal programs.

“The state budget has been reduced, and that’s the one we use on the day-to-day operation of schools. You can’t use much of the federal program funds to supplant local funds or state funds, so all of these federal funds have to be used to supplement,” he said. “We have a considerable amount of money for programs that go on top of the basic program, but the basic program is the one that is tight because we can’t just choose to use those funds for anything we would like to use them for.”

One priority Geren pointed out was the growth of the general fund balance.

The CISD fund balance as of Aug. 31 was estimated at $7 million, showing a decrease of $2.8 million for fiscal year 2009, according to the report.

But Geren said the TEA’s chief auditor and CISD Chief Financial Officer David Johnson estimated that the balance should be increased to $12 million, or about three months’ operating expenses.

“I’ve emphasized this since the new budget was presented, that the board and administration just have to commit themselves to saying that, if we have a nickel left over at the end of the year, that we’re going to use it to stay in the fund balance, to build it,” Geren said. “Which means with every opportunity, if you find out that we’re a little bit ahead, then we’re going to commit that to stay in the fund balance.”

At the conclusion of his report, Geren said he will monitor the district only two days a week, with the possibility of reduction in the coming months.

In other updates, former Santa Fe Elementary administrator Susie Sarchet reported on the status of the district’s strategic plan.

Since September Sarchet has recruited members for teams corresponding to certain strategic areas, including accountability, communication, education, learning plans, personnel, environment and character.

“They’ve met numerous times and continue to do that. Our goal is to have a beginning plan and a cost analysis to present to the original team in early December,” she said.

The board also approved the votes for the nominee for the Central Appraisal District of Johnson County’s Board of Directors election, placing 834 votes for Kent Williams and the remaining 83 for Sid Pruitt.

Cleburne High School Principal Monte Pritchett presented senior Lexy Hitchcock as the National Merit Commended Scholar for her high scores in the Preliminary SAT-National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test taken as a junior.

“We are very fortunate to have a student place high in this, and her scores are very good,” Pritchett said. “We’re thrilled to death that she did that, and it’s a great honor for her and her family.”