Jacksonville School District 117 got some good news on the financing aspect of the Vision 117 project.
Superintendent Steve Ptacek explains that, during the Committee of the Whole meeting, they learned that some of the projects are coming in under budget.
“It showed that we’re on track to be $200,000 under budget when it comes to our contingencies and allowances, potentially down to $50,000 under budget, potentially up to $400,000 or $500,000 under budget, but that’s a rough estimate. That furniture budget that we originally thought could be up to $750,000, we’re only talking about $200,000, and that includes new auditorium, new common area and new media center. So overall we’re hoping to keep the total price of the project from $26 million to $25.2 million or $25.3 million,” says Ptacek.
The majority of the conversation from last night’s meeting centered on the school’s budget, Ptacek let us know that the school is missing a large chunk of money that they should have received from the state. Ptacek explained what the budget looks like without those missing payments, and where the school expects to be budget-wise at the end of the year.
“As it stands right now, we’re going to be somewhere around $900,000 in the whole. When we get the $500,000 in the Pre-K (grant), we’ll probably be somewhere around $400,000 in the whole. Now, with an $18.9 million operating fund balance, it doesn’t put us in any necessity to start having to talk about big budget cuts for deficit reduction plan, but it is something that is slightly concerning at this point and time. But it does not instigate any need for us to talk about major cuts,” says Ptacek.
The rest of the meeting included approvals of bids for an Asphalt Sealcoat on school parking lots and playgrounds, as well as a bid to make a marquee for Lincoln Elementary. The board also approved the purchase of a new language arts program.
The board will have their next regular board meeting on June 21st.