The Kent School District unveiled the latest draft of its 2009-2010 operating budget during the Aug. 12 school board meeting.
The $261 million proposed budget is a less than $3 million increase over the adopted 2008-2009 budget, but accounts for a projected drop in revenues of more than $2.5 million.
Finance Director John Knutson said it was “kind of unheard of” to see a decrease in revenues from year-to-year when enrollment generally remained steady and added that this year the distract has encountered “wild cards like we have never seen.”
“This is really an anomaly,” agreed Fred High, assistant superintendent of business services, who said he had never seen a revenue decrease during his career.
The revenue drops are due primarily to a decrease in state funding of about $15 million due to the economic downtown. The money was partially made up by an increase in federal funding of nearly $9 million as well as $3.4 million in administration cuts and an additional $3.2 million in cuts culled from a community priority list created after a series of workshops this past winter.
The district will also dip into a larger-than-predicted fund balance to make up the difference.
Kent expects to start the year with a fund balance of $21 million, approximately $3 million more than project during the middle of last year.
Knutson said the additional money was saved because of conservation efforts throughout the year in expectation of reduced revenues.
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