Schools Budget Around Uncertain State Funding
By: Sophie Nielsen-Kolding WMBD/WYZZ-TV
Updated: March 22, 2013
BARTONVILLE - Uncertainty of state aid on top of unpaid funding is making it even more difficult for schools to budget cuts.
"At this point there's no state budget so nobody knows what kind of funding they're going to get," said Gerald Brookhart, the Peoria County Regional Superintendent.
Brookhart said uncertainty could be the biggest problem in trying to figure out next year's budget. He said dwindling state funding could seriously hurt area schools.
"Any district that relies heavily on state aid, in other words they don't have the infrastructure, the business those kind of things like you'd find in the Dunlaps and the Mortons. They're going to be the most seriously affected," Brookhart said.
And a lot of schools are waiting for thousands of dollars in state aid.
"We're behind, we're probably, this fiscal year we're probably in the ballpark of around 225 thousand dollars yet to come," said Allan Gresham, superintendent at Limestone Community High School in Bartonville.
This past year the state only promised 89 to every hundred dollars it was supposed to give in state aid. Now it could be even less.
"Next year our general state aid proration could be 82 percent, but we're not sure about that. We never know exactly what to budget for and that makes it difficult too because a lot of times your revenues are a moving target," Gresham.
At LCHS there will be less teachers to go around. Gresham said they aren't planning to replace people who are retiring or moving on.
His budget battle doesn't end there, assessed property taxes in the area went down, meaning LCHS can take another $40,000 out of the mix.
"Look at that as a teachers salary, that's one teacher," Gresham said.
Gresham said his staff is trying its best to keep these cuts out the classroom, but he said planning that is as unpredictable as the state's budget.
