PUSD gets extra cash in state budget

Special funds add to balance

Porterville Unified was pleased to learn when Gov. Jerry Brown signed the state budget this week, an additional $2 million dollars was included for the local school district.

Both Porterville Unified School District and the Burton School District recently finalized their budgets for the 2017-18 fiscal year.

PUSD has a total budget of almost $200 million, with $168 million of that the general fund and the rest categorical funds designated for a specific purchase, such as $10 million for the school lunch program.

Included in that $200 million, is about $44 million which comes via the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) designed for districts with 85 percent of their students listed as socioeconomically challenged.

“The district would be very challenged if it didn’t have those dollars,” said PUSD Superintendent Ken Gibbs, noting that not all districts receive the extra funds.

Overall, the district is getting about $6 million more in funding over last year.

A total of $170 million out of the $200 million goes to administrative, teacher and classified employee salaries and benefits, about 85 percent of the total.

Charter schools are a sep-

arate part of the budget. PUSD has $9 million budgeted for its two charter schools and another $1.5 million for the adult school.

The district is then left with about $20 to $25 million in reserve. Gibbs explained that reserve has been built up over time and they have to be very careful with the money they put to use. By law, school districts are required to have a 3 percent reserve, but Gibbs pointed out that would be less than one month’s operating budget, meaning if they did not have more, they could have to borrow money to make payroll, which would lead to more costs.

This year PUSD will get extra funds they had hoped to get from the State of California for the passing of Proposition 30 —Temporary Taxes to Fund Education measure — that temporarily raised sales taxes and created a new marginal tax rate for residents with incomes over $250,000 for public education. The sales tax increase expired at the end of 2016, but voters in the recent election approved Prop. 50, which extended the higher income tax rates through the end of 2030.

PUSD will be receiving a total of $18.6 million for the 2017-18 school year that will also include charter schools, and will have to make the decision of what that money will be going toward. This money cannot be used for salaries or benefits for administrators or other administrative costs, but solely for school construction projects or programs.

After construction of two-story buildings at both Porterville High School and Monache High School, the district will now be able to add a second wing at Monache.

Gibbs said the district already has $10 million for remodeling of the Adult School Center on Pioneer to add the Military Academy. That first phase, he said, is about ready to go out to bid and he hopes to see the work completed next spring. A second phase, to add a gymnasium, is another $7 million.

“It should go by fairly quickly, but there is of course always a chance it could be held up,” said Gibbs of the first phase.

Gibbs credits the district’s consistent growth throughout the last three years and recognizes that the worst thing that could happen would be declining enrollment. Much of the money the school gets is due to how many students attend, and districts can lose millions of dollars if enrollment drops.

The Burton School District is of course much smaller than PUSD, having less schools, and less students, so its budget is about a third of PUSD’S.

The total district budget for Burton is about $49 million, that’s counting money it gets for its charter schools, all school employees and benefits. Burton will have few thousands dollars less this year compared to the previous year.