I watched a great presentation at the School
Board workshop today on factors affecting future School District budget decisions. Much
financial pressure was removed due to Charlie Crist vetoing the Senate
Bill 6, which was mostly known for mandating teacher merit pay, but also
would have resulted in added District costs of about $13-million.
Additionally, the staff and Board member Rosanne Brandeburg developed a new budget status report that clearly laid out all the revenues and expenses and various factors affecting budget planning, such as changing State regulations or revenue source problems.
Finally, Harry Fix and the Facilities team provided a new, comprehensive study to rank and track the physical condition (i.e. how old the School Air conditioner is...) and technology environment in every School Building in Lake County. They now have the data to develop a better analysis of where to spend capital budgets and create them.
Kudos to the staff and Board for constantly moving into a "data driven" decision making mode, instead of making emotional decisions.
vj