The Morongo Unified School District Board of Education had a budget workshop in addition to its regular business meeting. Dan Stork breaks his report into two parts. Today, in part 1: good news and hard questions on the financial front…
During a budget workshop, Assistant Superintendent Dave Price told the Morongo Unified School District Board of Education that the District finished the last school year in the black. “I was so happy that we finally had a year that we did not have to deficit-spend.” The surplus was about $300,000, in a $70 million budget, and was due to several windfalls: 93 students returned to the District from Hope Academy; a payment related to the state dissolution of Redevelopment Agencies; federal impact aid related to having a military base in the District; an insurance carrier refund; and a large phone bill credit from Verizon. Going forward, the budget forecast for the current year was revised to reflect increased revenues from the return of students from Hope Academy, and from the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF), which is the new method introduced by Governor Brown to fund categorical programs. Price cautioned the Board not to count on the LCFF or the reserve fund balance to fund on-going programs, because of future uncertainties. The Board questioned Price on the meaning of the “unrestricted unassigned unappropriated” reserve fund balance of $8.3 million, with Board President Chris Proudfoot asking for a number he could take away with him describing how much money the Board had to spend on one-time projects. Price was clearly uncomfortable in giving an answer, citing state economic and governmental uncertainties, but he agreed that there might be as much as $5.4 million available.
