Van Buren Local Schools

The second installment of this month’s Knight Insight features Mrs. Cathy Schuller, Treasurer, as she shares an update on district finances as of November 2024.

Van Buren Family,

Each fiscal year (FY) (July 1 – June 30) in November and May, school districts are required by law to file a five-year forecast using General Fund data. The financial forecast is much like a painting of the future based upon a snapshot of today. It is a key management tool that should be updated periodically, and the numbers only tell a small part of the story. The five-year forecast encourages district management teams to examine the future projections and identify when challenges will arise in an effort to be proactive. 

The forecast is divided into two sections: revenue and expenditures. A district’s revenue is made up of two main sources: local and state funding. The expenditures mainly consist of salaries, benefits, purchased services, and materials/supplies. 

The Van Buren Local School District’s November 2024 forecast (FY25) is based on the current year’s spending plan and includes the passage of the most recent School District Income Tax (SDIT) renewal on November 5, 2024. The SDIT alone makes up 20% of district revenue, and we are grateful to the community for their support of the renewal of the SDIT to allow the continuation of the current levels of day-to-day operations for transportation, maintenance and repairs, utilities, staff salaries, and supplies. 

Below is a graph from the November 2024 five-year forecast that shows our True Cash Days, which is a metric we use to determine how many days we can continue to pay our operating expenses using our current cash reserves. Just like with our home finances, each year that our expenditures are higher than our revenue, we have to use a portion of our cash balance. It’s quite normal for districts to see falling numbers of True Cash Days in future years of the forecast because the numbers are based only on information known today. Multiple factors can change throughout the year, and this is why districts update forecasts periodically. Based on the data, the district estimates having 62 True Cash Days when we reach fiscal year 2029.

Considerations for our finances include building maintenance costs that are increasing each year. Future state funding is uncertain for FY26-29 as the Fair School Funding Plan is not funded beyond FY25. While Governor DeWine’s new two-year budget bill will begin in FY26, there are still details about it that are unknown at this time. The renewal of the income tax in 2024 and emergency levy in 2023 have improved our finances, but legislators have also formed a Joint Committee on Property Tax Review and Reform which is pending and could impact our revenue. 

The plan for daily operations can change quickly as new challenges arise, so as we continue to monitor the health of our funding, the next update for the five-year forecast is planned for May 2025 to reflect any new information that will impact our district’s finances.

Thank you again for your support of our school district. I am deeply committed to managing the district’s finances with the utmost integrity and transparency.

Sincerely,

Mrs. Cathy Schuller, Treasurer

To learn more about what is happening at Van Buren Local Schools, visit our website at vbschools.net.

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