TCU enters into deficit spending year

Fund areas within the 2020-2021 Tri-City United School District budget are going to have deficits and all areas are going to need to be revised as events change, according to the district’s director of business services.

“Budgets are estimates based on assumptions,” said Jean Kopp, TCU’s Director of Business Services. “There are so many unknowns that we are planning for.”

Kopp presented her request for approval of the fiscal year 2021 budget to the school board at its regular meeting on June 8.

In her proposal, she said that there is no clear look for how the district will look financially given everything that’s happened so far in 2020 and the many unknowns going into the future.

She said that revenue estimates for the district are based on state, local levy, and federal funding sources, and other local revenue. The expenses are also estimates based on staffing and programming needs and assumptions of operating expenditures.

Overall there are five funds that the district operates within. These include the general fund, food services, community services, building construction, and debt services.

Kopp said that the general fund will be in deficit spending this coming fiscal year, which begins July 1 and ends June 30, 2021.

She said the two most critical drivers of this are...

To see more on this story pick up the June 25, 2020 print edition of the Montgomery Messenger.