Published: September 02, 2009 01:02 pm      

Budget approved after overcoming deficit

Rio Vista trustees were contemplating the dilemma of a deficit budget last week.

A weekend’s worth of paperwork by interim superintendent Steve Madson turned the minus into a surplus of some $7,000.

Trustees on Monday night approved the 2009-10 budget and a tax rate of $1.183 per $100 property value.

Budget revenue was $9,335,375.17. Final projected expenses were trimmed to $9,328,375.17.

If the $7,000 surplus is realized, the money will go to the district’s fund balance.

Sacrifices were made to balance the bottom line, Madson said.

“We have some capital improvements such as air conditioners, buses and dishwashers that will have to wait another year. If we have to get by with what we have, we can make it. We did the best we could to reduce expenses without shorting our campuses.”

Instructional expenses were spared cuts.

“Our teachers got the mandatory raise, roughly $800,” Madson said.

Had Rio Vista adopted a deficit budget, it might not have been able to square the bottom line with money from the fund balance, which has dwindled in recent years.

“We’ve got work to do to build back our fund balance and do it in a way that doesn’t affect the quality of education here,” Madson said. “It’s a challenge, but the board is unified on the subject.”

Like a number of other districts, Rio Vista has been hampered financially by static or declining enrollment. Most of a district’s revenue, under the state funding formula, is tied to average daily attendance.

“Our enrollment hasn’t gone up like we hoped it would,” Madson said. “ADA has stayed about the same while salaries and other expenses have continued to increase. At Rio Vista, we have a student to teacher ratio of 10 to 1, and that’s expensive.”