001[Music] [Laughter] [Music] n a [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Applause] [Music] he a [Music] okay good evening we're back for another budget Workshop welcome to Christine Griffin our new assistant superintendent for business and happy birthday to Dr teranova happy [Music] birthday thank you it's a fivey year anniversary correct yeah so that's it for introductions and we will begin with uh Christine I think take yeah I'm Tim wants to say something first well first of all welcome to Christine uh this is her first official budget presentation but we're lucky to have her uh great experience at Oakfield and other areas a significant experience as a Treasurer and as an assistant or Director of Business uh Administration and business in Oakfield for many years so we're lucky to have somebody with this kind of expertise she and
002I have been collaborating but she's doing obviously the bulk of the the heavy lifting around our budget and we're going to talk about revenue and continue to look at that concept of refining what our revenue is going to be for next year as well as we refine our expenses and I think that's where we're going to continue to go to as we move into Personnel next month so without further Ado I'll turn it over to Mrs Griffin thank you Tim so tonight we're just uh the goals of the budget we're going to go over that a little bit tonight we're going to talk a uh take a look at our preliminary new yor New York state aid um our tax cap uh calculation a first look at that um and then um our overall revenue
003and how that ties out and again a review of the remaining C budget calendar items um obviously we start you know reviewing our goals from the 2526 budget um you've seen these before I won't go through all of them again um maybe just highlight that you know one of the goals and when you're looking at this from a revenue perspective is maintaining and stabilizing our reserves um and maximizing um our ability to generate state aid and of course if I picked a third it would have to be transparency as always um on an this is on an overview uh just to let you know you know why we really focus on those two areas versus others our our local tax revenue 60 um 61% of our Revenue comes from our local tax base um and
00438% comes from the state so those are the two areas that we're going to focus on tonight uh this is a preliminary look at state aid this is as of February 26 2025 um overall our state aid is up 2.41% from prior year um for $949,000 um right now this is still an estimate obviously the state um the governors released their budget in January however um we won't know these final numbers until April 1st or after [Music] um I wanted to point out if you reference back to the January presentation there was um um a total state aid number that was slightly different um so you'll see that this is the um this is the actual state aid that came from the um Governor's budget so when you're looking at 2425 um I just wanted
005to point that out um I'm not 100% sure where some of some of that difference was but I I think it might have something to do with the inclusion of upk Aid um Foundation Aid is only up 4.29% uh for $1,940 um two things that impacted that this year were um the governor did accept a couple of the elements from the Rockefeller study those recommendations one of them was replacing the free and reduced lunch counts um with the economically disadvantaged rate and also they replaced the census 2000 which is quite dated data with um the small area income and poverty estimates saap also another key thing on here that I think is um You Catches your eye would be our Bose's Aid that number is looking um actually down a little bit um it's slow
006it's low it's actually showing lower than previous year that three 3 million 213 for 2425 is actually what we're going to get um in previous budget years um you'll find that number will be a little bit higher we're going to refine that one of the things that the difficulty in um allocating your or estimating your Bose Aid is the fact that you have expense you haven't experienced your full expenses they expense based AIDS so for the 2425 full year expenses haven't been incurred so we don't know necessarily what that's going to be so we're going to take a deep dive deeper dive into those numbers um and we'll hopefully be able to project full year expenses for this year to be able to try and determine what our our Bose Aid will be I expect
007that number is going to come up um especially since we had $3.2 million and traditionally that Bose Aid has gone up a little bit every year as our expenses have gone up in that category um transportation Aid is pretty accurate um and your other state aid is is is a smaller smaller percentage of that can I just I'll add something and just this goes to the board of education so the governor's Foundation a 26,588 7,119 we've told people publicly um we're pleased that it's greater than 2% but it barely meets our needs right now with the growth of our district that we've had over the past 15 to 20 years and the needs of our kids so we have multiple meetings set up with our legislators for the for the second round this board of
008education has done an amazing job advocating for the district and that's the area we have the most influence on Foundation Aid so we are hopeful to have meetings with individual legislators at after the legislative branch puts out their state aid run which should be happening any time now again the governor does hers the legislators do theirs and then they discuss and hopefully supposedly by April 1st which is what they're supposed to do they come up with a final number the point is we've got to continue to Advocate Advocate to increase that amount uh that is based upon the needs of our district so that advocacy is going to be very important um continuing on just a couple of comments on the the preliminary state aid um the building Aid amount for 25 um 20 2526
009reflected in the governor proposal does not include any aid for the new capital project that won't you won't see that impact impact until the 26 27 school year that has been confirmed I think last uh time uh one of the last presentations from take he wasn't sure when that you know what that was and he was going to follow up so I wanted to make sure we followed on that and then again I commented down below about the Bose Aid we've already talked about that moving on to our tax cap calculation um with all the inputs uh into the formula our tax cap percentage increase can be 3.04% for a um increase of 1,785 957 I want to talk talk about factors that are impacting that tax cap calculation so um I put on here
010some factors uh what they were in 2425 and the change to 2526 so the tax-based growth factor um in the formula for 2526 was 1.158 that went down to 1.0 1117 so that change impacted our tax cap on a downward um method um by about $240,000 um we had an increase in pilots from the 2425 to the 25 26 school year um that has a direct impact on this um so we're not able to Levy that amount so that's um $163,000 um our Capital exclusions um stayed pretty level and that's kind of what you your goal is is to keep that that pretty steady so it doesn't have big swings and um an impact on your tax um cap so that didn't have a huge impact um kind of talk a little bit about CPI
011um obviously the tax cap formula that everyone knows they they look at it it's capped at 2% this is the the piece that's capped at 2% so um it didn't change from last year because last year it was uh the CPI exceeded the 2% this year the same thing no difference the uh CPI exceeded uh the 2% that it was 2.95% it would have 2.95% of the ucpi that impact on our tax cap is $575,000 that we can because that we miss out on inflation's higher we're capped at 2% just taking a look at our tax levy history over uh the last five years you know you're looking at a 3.13% increase between the years 2125 or 2122 to 2526 so so pretty and it pretty steady um overall on our Revenue you know at
012this point in time bottom line from budget last year to what we're projecting this year uh for the 25 26 school year is an increase of $2.1 million or 2.12% um this is where I wanted to kind of note that that state aid number on here is the budgeted number this 39 million 904 um that is a budgeted number budgeted number from the prior year the previous slide that I had shown you that was the actual State a so we were comparing actuals to actuals versus budget to actuals but this is actually budget to what we project for next year so going forward um we have the dates for our next meetings but I wanted to talk about where we're what we're going to be looking at between now and now and then and now
013over the next month or so but um we're going to be looking at the expense side of the budget kind of Shifting Gears a little bit while we wait to hear more on the governor's um budget but um I'm going to be working with Dorothy on the Personnel side of the budget um that'll be at the next presentation on W Wednesday March 12th um we are taking a look at the Bose expenditures um we have not seen those yet um in details we have a a rough idea and we've talked about what services um and we've done the um cross contracts with the other districts it's the Wayne finger lak bosis that build the um services that we were waiting for so they've shifted gears this year they're doing an online process so we're waiting
014for access to that system to be able to get to those numbers uh so we're going to be refining that and having conversations about um you know what the request are um we're also going to be taking a look at the current year budget um and how we're performing and what we might have for a projected fund balance at the end of this fiscal year um and we're going to take a look at a long-term financial plan um what we're what we're looking at down the road um with these Trends which um you know state aid can't stay at the pace that it is and you know the more advocacy that could be done for that um is obviously helpful um and again we're just keeping monitoring from the state yeah really to summarize we
015have still some uncertainty with Foundation a obviously that's the big one we have uncertainty with just finalizing our Bose's a and we still have to really refine our expenses the challenge right now as Christine said is our revenue is going to be looking like somewhere between two and 3% increase and our expenses if we're really good are probably going to be close to 5 to 5 a half% so there's going to be a gap between the expenses and the revenue we know that especially in the last three years four years I think say we've tried to have somewhere between a 3 to 5% contingency in terms of money we've saved from expenses to then put in reserves every year that's still the plan for next year but we have to be cognizant that that Gap
016might have to be filled to some degree by the contingency and that's where we have to talk as a board and a group because that gets on the edge of being fiscally consistent and being able to be stable year to year that's our challenge right now we want to take that whatever money is that 3 to 5% that we save at the end of 24 25 and we want to be able to refurbish our RIS reserves with that uh if our Gap is too great between the expenses of revenue for next year then we have to use some of that to fill it and now you start to get into a bit of a situation where you got to be really monitoring to make sure you're not getting into a negative Financial uh situation year
017to year so we're right on the edge it's it's I guess the point is is we are definitely in a challenging situation uh I really really uh thank all the the district leadership and the administration especially the principles working with our district office to look at our expenses and make sure that we're servicing kids at the level that we need to we added significant Staffing in the last three years three to four years and we have to keep that Staffing so I mean it's necessary so that's why the advocacy we're doing and just continuing to work together to make sure you get as much information as possible around what we need to do uh financially moving forward is really important so I just wanted to make sure that was out there okay um board members
018questions and anything Mrs Mitchell uh delivered a question from home she couldn't be here with us tonight but she is watching and um this was a very valid point for those who aren't as familiar can you define for the public or anyone who's watching CPI and Pilots so that they know what those inputs were that we were talking about absolutely so thanks so ppi is the Consumer Price Index um that is what expenses are increasing year-over-year um that is the factor that gets impacted with the 2% that you're capped at you can't go above that um Pilots is payments in Le of taxes those are tax agreements with properties um usually mun not Municipal but businesses in the um area for uh their taxes instead of being in the assessment being being um in the
019assessed values and then they pay taxes that way that's usually part of Economic Development within a municipality good question from Mrs Mitchell from H yes thank you trust me there's a lot of acronyms in school finance and and it can get confusing yes we want to make sure everyone understands those inputs the tax cap where does what's that where is that derived from the percentage at least so these are the factors that go into the tax cap so you'll see on there when we talk about pilot if you go down about line I'll use an example um you start with your Levy from the prior year and you have various factors that go in and out of that um your Pilots receivable from the prior year your pilot receivable from the current year that net
020change impacts it your Capital exclusion from the prior year and your Capital exclusion from the current year impacts that um the 2% growth factor is um um so as the math goes down and this is kind of a condensed version of it but you take your you start with your beginning value it increases by your tax based growth factor then they do some other math then they add the 2% and that that brings you down to the levy limit before for the exclusions so it it is a it's a formula that um pretty prescribed by the state but the 2% is one factor in it um as you can see bottom line the increase can go up to 3. would that 2% have any correlation at all to inflation no well no because last year
021inflation was 4% and we were still capped at 2% no but doesn't it kind of it means the same thing to us when we're trying to figure things out and pay for things correct yes or no am I am I missing that like C CPI doesn't factor in into this at all um when you say CP I can use the actual word so I can get it sorry Consumer Price Index Consumer Price Index is not a factor in this the reason that I pointed out the Consumer Price Index is inflation is is increasing our costs at a higher rate than we're actually allowed all right that's kind of what I'm getting increase doesn't make any sense to me that they're different it doesn't no it doesn't since the tax cap formula was implemented in in
022201 um 11 12 school year um you know when we're not in a major inflationary period sometimes that was that factor was below 2% um but in the in more recent years it's been a a significant impact the fact that your expenses are going up higher yet where we can't raise our tax levy more than that one piece of it more than that factor so if if I may when we look at personnel and the next go around we're really considering CPI inflation with regard to looking at for salaries and increases and whatnot right I mean that's not necessarily something we're going to discuss here but I'm I'm sort of using my corporate hat to say here's your 2% based on what the formula is telling you you get but really you're going to be
023dealing with about 5% for inflation expenditures that could hit you so you're going to defay 3% of a hit as a opposed to five and you're right that makes things challenging very challenging y especially when you want to be very supportive and make sure we're operating at the highest capacity that we can correct hence the reason for the continued advocacy because we're we're handcuffed we're handcuffed by a tax cap and the amount of state aid we get so we really need to make sure they understand the differences that are happening in Victor from other school districts and I think people forget that for years and years Victor was penalized yeah through Foundation Aid to the tune of well over a hundred million doar that can you imagine if we had that money now but we're
024never going to get that money right uh because we were one of the only districts years ago that was growing While others were losing enrollment so this is kind of the consequences of of dealing with that where were the primary years where that was really effect that kind of that accumulated from the foundation Aid what year I guess I would ask what year did Foundation a I take a look at the data I don't have I don't have the specifics but um they ran about 10 years I think 09 I think it started at 09 so any anytime seven actually those seven yeah all the way up they had that Gap elimination adjust Gap elimination was another gift from the state when we were and let's see 20 this is 24 25 this is the
025first year believe we've been fully funded which means from ' 07 till basically 2023 we were short changed and that added up exponentially over millions and millions and millions of dollars just I think to piggy back off for your question which I think is a great one to frame it in terms of thinking about really what's the impact when we look at the allowable Levy increase of 3.04 but are cap at two where's the distance there or are they even related the the 2% is one factor in in the calculation of it um you are allowed to Levy for um increases in your um say in uh a capital expenditure so this went up for example um $50,000 our our Levy exclusion went from 2455 to 2.55 we are able to Levy and increase our
026Levy by that increase does that make sense so that um the way the formula is factored in that um economic uh activity in your community based in your your your tax-based growth that's a factor you know if you have Pilots coming in and out new new tax revenues they use that as a factor in it so it's just one factor in all of it I I know the the narrative in a lot of times in the community across the state is 2% 2% 2% but it really is just one small factor and you know when you have a situation where you need to um you know make a capital expenditure you need to be able to to to Levy for that so that's what makes this Formula Three and .4% versus 2% and loan rates
027aren't coming down either so no great questions any questions any indication from legisl legislators and in terms of the budget process and whether it's going to be released in April or no we haven't heard I haven't heard anything since our last meeting with I forgot who the last person we met with or since probably the breakfast the legislative breakfast so I've got very little information which is why we're I think our first our first meeting is next week with a our first our second meeting with the legisl one of the legislators or two of the legislators next week I think we'll find out more then okay yeah because they it's still I mean the governor's budget isn't necessarily the final budget no um which means the legislators have the opportunity to make changes and with
028our advocacy we could helpfully push them in the right direction so that we can help solve issues I think assembly person assembly member Bailey said it at the breakfast Victors an anomaly among districts around here and I think that is true and we have to capitalize on that and make sure people understand it just like you said yeah she was very clear that after speaking to several other districts in her one month on duty that she was hearing very different things from Victor and and she is tracking that so okay we got our challenges ahead of us all right anything else thank you Christine thank you Dr T thank you nice job as usual and uh stay tuned everyone we'll be back thanks thanks for