DISTRICT BUDGET

District’s revenues continue healthy growth

By Steven Lehigh, AFT Rep. to District Budget & Finance Committee., CSM Economics

Here’s a look at revenue estimates adopted in the 2016/17 budget (rounded and in millions):
The District has continued to see the majority of increased revenue from growth in property taxes. While not the largest percentage change, property taxes make up 75-80% of the revenue, so the roughly 7% growth constitutes the bulk of growth in the revenue. While the current projected revenue growth is estimated at 4.5% overall, the revenue projections have been conservative in previous years. For instance (again excluding the $9.9M in Innovation Fund money) in last year’s projection, revenue was predicted to grow from $141.7M to $146.9M (3.7%), but instead grew to $156.6M (10.5%).
Based on the current projections, due to our community-supported status, our budget is $52M (47%) above the state limit. Regardless of where the final numbers for 16/17 end up, it’s safe to say our budget is in a very stable place.
Despite the rosy budget picture, many issues relevant to faculty persist, as evidenced by the lengthy contract negotiations. Many of these issues have been covered in previous Advocate articles and were mentioned in last year’s budget update.
Please feel free to contact me with any district budget related questions, or topics you would like covered.

*$9.9M has been removed from the “Other” category for 15/16. These funds were a one-time back payment from the state for mandated costs. This money was all allocated as Innovation Funds. For purposes of year-to-year comparison they were excluded.