Lee Pulaski, lpulaski@wolfrivermedia.com
The Shawano School Board unanimously approved its 2014-15 budget Monday, but it came with a warning that a larger tax hike could be looming next year.
The budget kept the 2014 tax rate at $10.34 per $1,000 of equalized valuation, 3 cents higher than last year. The owner of a home worth $100,000 will pay $1,034 in school taxes this year, compared to $1,031 last year.
The total levy for 2014 will be $12,980,551.
The budget presentation included the news that the official enrollment counted taken on the third Friday in September, which is used to calculate state aid for school districts, showed Shawano has 101 fewer students this year than it did a year ago.
The decline in enrollment means less per-pupil aid from the state in 2015, which means the district might have to turn to taxpayers to make up the difference. The district expects to receive $13,595,471 in state aid this school year.
Business manager Louise Fischer did not have an estimate on how much state aid would be lost in 2015.
“We’re not going to spend as much money this year as we did last year, so that’s going to affect our equalized aid, depending on who is governor and what the Legislature decides to appropriate for equalization money,” Fischer said. “With all those factors in mind, and we’re going to communicate this with the public as much as possible, there’s going to be definite increase in the mill rate, possibly a substantial one.”
With enrollment lower than expected, the district adjusted its budget to maintain the $10.34 tax rate. Earlier this summer, the district planned to levy about $600,000 below the maximum the state would allow, but with Monday’s decision the district is levying about $207,000 less than its state-imposed limit.
The September enrollment also showed the district was attracting 198 students this year through open enrollment, while 157 students living in the district opted to attend school elsewhere. A few years, Shawano schools enjoyed an almost 2-to-1 ratio of students coming in versus going out.
The number of students leaving the district is almost 50 more than a year ago. Superintendent Gary Cumberland told the board that he could not explain the increase, but a survey has gone out to the families to find out the cause.
Planned expenditures for 2014-15 total $37,145,064. Fischer said there is a deficit of about $211,000 in the budget, down from $400,000 earlier in the budget planning cycle.
“This is a tight budget,” Fischer said.
The budget includes $17,000 to purchase a used truck for maintenance, $50,000 to cover substitute teacher costs after the board increased the pay from $90 daily to $120, $5,000 for a mandatory actuarial study and $10,000 to set up a data warehouse.
In addition to property taxes and general state aid, the district anticipates receiving about $11 million from local fees, open enrollment dollars from the state, other state sources and federal grants.