School board discusses possible impact of funding legislation on district finances

By Steve Moyer

Nevada Daily Mail

The Nevada R-5 Board of Education met Wednesday evening during which Board President Dr. Warren Lovinger turned to Superintendent Ted Davis to explain the situation with pending legislation that will impact the district's funding for next year.

"I will make it very brief," Davis said. "There are two bills of interest, SB 287 is the new foundation formula. It is still in a form that would be very favorable for us. There is a similar bill in the house."

Both change the way the state would compute payments to schools. "Both bill would change from being levy driven to a student needs-based formula," Davis said. "We would benefit from either one. There are a few districts in the northwest part of the state that are sparsely populated that might have some problem but we're OK."

Both bills would have a period during which the state transitions to the new formula but differ in how long a period that might be.

"The senate bill would phase in four years," Davis said. "The house version would take five, six or even seven years to phase in."

Even though the new formula would be figured on a students' needs basis it still takes district levies into account.

The new formula would be based on the average school district having a levy of $3.35.

"They set $3.35 as the average they expect," Davis said. "Much lower than that and they would penalize you and much higher and they would penalize you. You would still benefit from the increase in local funds but wouldn't get any extra state money."

Davis said the legislature has been examining ways to raise the money to pay for the new formula. "They have discussed phasing out more Medicaid and they have looked at gambling for extra money," Davis said.

At the end of the phase-in period, the district should see an extra $2.4 million per year in state money under the proposed bills.

"I've looked at the numbers and it's still $2.4 million," Davis said.

The board also reviewed the annual bus safety inspection recently performed by the Missouri State Highway Patrol.

"I am very pleased to report that for the first time in a long time, maybe ever, 100 percent of the busses passed inspection," Davis said. "We have a very large fleet. We are a large district, geographically, and there always seems to be something that was looked at just the day before and was all right but developed a problem by the time the highway patrol inspected it."

Davis praised the efforts of the mechanics and the transportation supervisor.

"Rick Praisewater and Jim Phelps do a great job," Davis said. "They and Cliff Pettibon see safety as their number one challenge. Considering that we had 48 buses inspected, our transportation department did an extraordinary job and are certainly to be congratulated on their fine effort."

In other business, the board:

* Approved a bid from TeamBank to continue providing banking services to the district.

"We received bid proposals from three financial institutions; US Bank, Heritage State Bank, and TeamBank," Davis said. "All three provide similar services."

"We looked at two simulations comparing the three proposals," Davis said. "At the minimum we expect to have in the funds, the difference is $5,000. If we look at what I think are more realistic numbers, then the difference is $10,000, which is nice to have."

* Approved a bid from Daniel, Schell, Wolfe and Associates to provide auditing services for the 2004-'05 through 2006-'07 school years. Daniel, Schell, Wolfe, and Associates provided the low bid of $23,025. Ralph Schumaker bid $28,800 and Larson Allen bid $34,500.

* Approved the purchase of two school buses from Midwest Bus Sales for $45,828 each, the low bid. The buses will be 2006, 65 passenger buses with Mercedes diesel engines.

* Approved renewing the health insurance provided by Blue Cross and Blue Shield which gave the district a savings of $121,177 annually.

* Approved the 2004-'05 school calendar with 174 days of school with the final day of school set for Tuesday, May 24, at 1 p.m.