Whitnall District Thinks it Can Overcome Projected Shortfall

Based on preliminary projections and analysis of Gov. Scott Walker’s budget proposal, the Whitnall School District could face a $300,000 shortfall during the next fiscal year.

But Superintendent Lowell Holtz believes that with the controversial budget repair bill in place and frugal decisions when it comes to replacing retiring teachers,.

“That’s what we’re hoping for,” Holtz said. “With the budget-repair bill, the state is trying to repair the $1 billion hole in the state budget, and if they can do that, conceivably we won’t have (future) mass slashes to school districts once it’s repaired.”

The administration gave a presentation of the projected impact at a School Board work session on Monday.

“When it was finished it was obvious to everybody these are the most monumental changes in public education in history,” Holtz said. “There’s a lot of work to do.”

According to the presentation, Whitnall had a revenue limit of approximately $24, 472,000 this school year. With the proposed state cuts, that would drop to $22,743,000 in 2011-12, or a projected loss of $1.7 million.

Holtz said approximately $950,000 of that would be offset in reductions to employee benefits, as outlined in the budget-repair bill.

That would leave the district with a projected shortfall of $780,000. The district would then apply roughly $480,000 from the Education Jobs Fund against that, leaving a final net shortfall of approximately $300,000.

“We’re lucky because we anticipated some of this happening and waited to spend our jobs funds money,” said Holtz, referring to a federal program that provided $10 billion in assistance to states for schools in 2010-11.

That $300,000 could potentially be made up through retiring teachers’ salaries coming off the books, either by not replacing the retirees or doing so with cheaper employees. Holtz said the district had four teachers that were retiring for sure and another “half dozen” still considering retirement.

“When someone retires, the district recognizes the savings,” Holtz said. “Will you decrease staffing through attrition, or reduce (the financial gap) by offering smaller (salary and benefit) packages?”

Holtz emphasized Monday's projections were just that, and that the numbers presented could change rapidly and frequently.

“We’re just trying to figure out how we’re going to move forward if all the changes go through and how we’re going to have positive communication with our staff so they don’t feel shut out of all of this,” he said.