Here are two links to the Minnesota Department of Education's website that will shed some light on Matt's question about how dollars are spent (along with information about where dollars come from). The first link documents revenue streams for Minnesota school districts in FY 2003, the most recent year for which these data are available. St. Paul's data is on line 305. The second link documents how Minnesota school districts spent their revenue in FY 2003. St. Paul's data is on line 307. The state's school districts provide this data to MN Department of Education, which arranges and reports the data statewide in this format.
Readers who browse in these files will be able to see where St. Paul's money comes from, how it is spent, AND compare revenue and expense percentages to other districts in the state. While these data are more than a year old, it is not likely that the percentages have made huge jumps in the succeeding years. Minnesota School District revenue sources (St. Paul is line 305) http://education.state.mn.us/content/072756.xls Minnesota School District expenditures (St. Paul is line 307) http://education.state.mn.us/content/072757.xls Regarding the second part of his question, "the gaps that remain when those dollars are gone," school districts and schools are required to align their expense budgets with projected revenues. School districts are working on the 2005-06 (school year) budget that is due to the state by June 30, 2005. The first (and primary) budget question that a St. Paul public school will ask is "Is our projected revenue enough to allow us to carry our current programs forward into next year?" Even if a school add no staff positions, it will have increased staff costs due to cost of living increases in employment contracts. If the answer to this primary budget question is "no," the school cuts expenses until it meets the projected revenue figure, in effect closing the gap between projected revenue and projected expenses. In the past five years, The St. Paul School district as a whole has made approximately $25 million in expense reductions to balance its annual budget against annual projected revenue. This year the anticipated shortfall is $24.3 million (last figure I heard) before any of the projected increases in funding proposed by legislators or the governor are subtracted. Other districts across the state have faced similar cuts, suggesting a statewide problem rather than being an issue of poor financial management by any one district--St. Paul included. In truth there are no simple answers to education finance questions. That said, the sound bite answer to the question "why is education funding so scarce?" appears to be that after taking over the lion's share of education funding (by legislative act from local government, during--I believe--the Ventura administration), the legislature has not funded K-12 education at a rate that keeps pace with rising expenses. In my view, those attending the rally yesterday were saying to the governor and the legislature, "fund education THIS YEAR (and in the future) so our district(s) do not need to continue to make cuts as expenses increase." The K-12 funding issue will take center stage, I'm sure, in the state's budge debate. Remember, the state is constitutionally mandated to balance its budget. Roger Barr Support Our Schools -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Matt Flory Sent: Monday, February 28, 2005 10:25 PM To: [email protected] Subject: [StPaul] Scarce Education Dollars It seems like a strong case for more state dollars would be grounded in a strong understanding of how current dollars are spent and the gaps that remain when those dollars are gone. Do list members feel that they understand how the Saint Paul schools spend existing funding? Are there things we could do better with the dollars we have? How can we be better advocates at both the state and local level? Matt Flory Mac Groveland __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com ------------------------------------------------- JOIN the St. Paul Issues Forum TODAY: http://www.e-democracy.org/stpaul/ ------------------------------------------------- POST MESSAGES HERE: [email protected] To subscribe, modify subscription, or get your password - visit: http://www.mnforum.org/mailman/listinfo/stpaul Archive Address: http://www.mnforum.org/mailman/private/stpaul/ ------------------------------------------------- JOIN the St. Paul Issues Forum TODAY: http://www.e-democracy.org/stpaul/ ------------------------------------------------- POST MESSAGES HERE: [email protected] To subscribe, modify subscription, or get your password - visit: http://www.mnforum.org/mailman/listinfo/stpaul Archive Address: http://www.mnforum.org/mailman/private/stpaul/
