The Winslow Unified School District Governing Board met last week and were presented with information regarding their aggregate expenditure limit.
District Business Manager Shirley Lomeli stated, “This limit is actually a constitutional aggregate limit, and it could affect our district in the current school year. Right after we adopted our budgets, we started being told that we had exceeded the expenditure limit set by the legislature. Basically, they are telling us that we could be facing a huge reduction in our current budget.”
To explain further, she said, “The aggregate expenditure limit is the amount that the district spends in all K-12 sites. Included in the aggregate calculation is all funding except federal COVID relief funds, grants and budget overrides.”
Part of the reason most districts in the state have exceeded their budgets is response to COVID in the way of technology purchases and the decline in enrollment. The decline resulted in significant funding reductions. WUSD receives approximately $4,700 per student each year in state funding.
Lomeli said, “Another reason is that historically, Prop. 301 (a statewide sales tax increase implemented by voters to fund classrooms) funding was not included in the calculation, but this year it was. That amounts to over $600 million towards the limit.”
The Arizona Legislature could allow statewide school districts to exceed the expenditure limit, however, it will require a vote of 2/3 in both the Senate and House of Representatives by March 1.
“Even so,” said Lomeli, “that would only fix the problem for this current school year.”
So far, that legislation has not taken place. School districts around Arizona are facing millions of dollars in budget cuts and, according to Lomeli, some may have to close their doors.
“If the Arizona legislature does not act to exceed the expenditure limit, it would mean the loss of jobs and elimination of important student programs.”
She continued, “We are depending on them to actually take a vote and vote in favor of exceeding the limit. Winslow alone stands to lose $2.3 million.”
Holbrook is facing a potential reduction of $2.6 million and Joseph City could see a reduction of $820,376.
She continued, “Statewide, we could lose about $1.1 billion in March of this year. Those are existing funds our legislature and governor have already given to school districts in our existing budget. This would be a major disaster for Arizona school districts.
“As a district, we continue to spend and we don’t have the students coming in so we are relying on federal funding, state funding and anything we can to continue spending as we are.”
Lomeli noted that WUSD is in sound financial shape and will continue to be despite this year’s potential reduction. “However,” as she explained, “that will not be the same for next year or the year after. We will have to tap in to reserves and that is not sustainable.”
The governing board, Superintendent Connie Gover and Lomeli all encouraged teachers, parents and other stakeholders to contact their representatives in the state government in hopes to inform them of the importance of this vote.
In her report, Superintendent Gover said, “We are finally seeing some relief from the latest surge of COVID cases. We knew the spike was coming, watched it happen and now it looks like we have hit the peak and are starting to go back down. On Jan. 31, we had 13 cases district wide but now we have three, so the numbers are going down. That is a positive for us. But I need to encourage everyone, if you are sick or your kids are sick, keep them at home. We are highly recommending everyone wear a mask, sanitize hands and keep your work areas clean.”
In other business, and in the absence of Vice President Al Leonard, the governing board:
* Accepted a donation in the amount of $1,000 from Rayline Installations, Inc. for the Winslow High School Doc Wright hospitality room.
* Accepted a donation of 400 thumb drives estimated to be valued at $1,600 from Melisa Needens.
* Approved the hiring of Mariana Castruita and Brian Saucedo as paraprofessionals; Betty Clark, Navajo Language teacher at WHS; Nizhoni Johnson, district emergency substitute teacher; and Keith James, district bus driver.
* Accepted the resignation of Kylee Allen, Anthony Reynoso and Marianne Richardson.
* Approved extra duty stipends of $500 for Lisa Long and Natalie Barrios to serve as sponsors for homecoming and prom.
* Approved student activity fundraisers of selling Valentine candy grams and raising funds for prom.
* Heard a presentation from technology director Steve Henling in which he let the governing board know the district is technologically up to date. Over 300 cameras exist throughout the district, 150 internet access points and the district owns over 1,500 chrome books for student use.
