Finance Advisory Meeting – February 9, 2006
Submitted by: Christi Zeller
The Finance Advisory Committee (FAC) met with Diane Doney. Members in attendance, Christi Zeller, Judy Abercrombie, Kimbrough Hall, Todd Rodas and John Reiter. Also in attendance were Vickie Gallegos and 9-R Board Member Jeff Schell.
Minutes from the FAC meeting on January 13, 2006 were approved unanimously with one attendance member correction and one typographical error in the years. Christi will submit minutes to the DAAC and Diane Doney will submit them into the board packets.
A review of the language charges was presented to the full committee. A strike through version and a clean copy was used to carefully review changes, additions and deletions. Minor changes were made for clarification. The committee discussed how to monitor the EL’s, 7, 8 and 9. Christi will request an electronic version of all policies and create a check off box. Judy Abercrombie agreed to help with this process. There was some paperwork frustration issues discussed and this form of monitoring will help with communication with the board. The article in the newspaper on February 8th was discussed, and a lengthy discussion arose as to working papers for the FAC, handouts for guest attendees, and information that may become controversial in the paper. With good committee member skills, the public can be educated as to the work that is being done by this committee. All agreed that discretion is always important with respect to financial documents and reports not yet received by the full board. The FAC members all agreed to support the chair and attend school board meetings when reports to the board are scheduled. The next Report to the board will be on March 14th, with the charges and accomplishments.
Regarding the multi-year plan language under EL-7 #9, Kim reviewed the dictionary meaning, which can mean two years. The reporting and changing environment in this committee believes that the multi-year plan as stated in EL-7 #9, is the prior year actuals, current budget year and two years of future projections as to the General Fund. This will be recommended as requested by the 9-R school board as the clarification of this term. As the fiscal year ends, the current budget turns to prior year actuals, and revolves in a system to have 4 years worth of percentages or totals. Discussion was concentrated on the users of this information and all agreed that this is important to the board and the public. Concerns were raised a to #9, if it becomes necessary for the Finance Director to expend in a fiscal year more funds than are conservatively projected to be received then the multi-year plan would also be affected. Background: EL-7 # 9 States: “plans for the expenditures in any fiscal year of more funds than are conservatively projected to be received in that period unless otherwise approved by the board in a multi-year plan.”
As to the preamble, “Financial planning for any fiscal year shall not deviate materially from the board’s Ends Policies, violate Executive Limitation Policies, risk fiscal jeopardy, or fail to be derived from a multi-year plan that is curriculum driven, this discussion centered around the new clarification of #9, makes this preamble clearer, with expenses mostly for teacher salaries and salaries sensitive in nature, the budget is curriculum driven and projections considering compensation and benefits can be shared with the board.
Regarding EL-7 #8: “endangers the fiscal soundness of future years or ignores the building of organizational capability sufficient to achieve Ends Policies in future years. Future years in this situation has nothing to do with a financial multi-year plan, but more with the costs necessary to provide excellent educational opportunities to students. The committee did ask Diane to provide an example of monitoring language for #8.
Christi will circulate a draft of the report to the board prior to presentation.
The next report to the 9-R Board of Education by this committee is March 14th, 2006.
The next meeting is March 20th, 2006 at 7:30 AM.