Ronan school budget corrected
Megan Strickland
County Commissioner Gale Decker questioned the Ronan School District’s spending habits at the board’s Nov. 11 meeting.
Megan Strickland
Rob Tougas, director of transportation for Ronan School District, used a bus seat as a visual aid during a presentation at the Nov. 11 board meeting. Three elementary-sized children can sit in a seat, but middle and high schoolers are squeezed with two bodies in a seat, Tougas explained.
Megan Strickland
Rob Tougas, director of transportation for Ronan School District, used a bus seat as a visual aid during a presentation at the Nov. 11 board meeting.
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RONAN — The Ronan School District notified state officials and corrected an error in the district’s transportation budget less than 24 hours after the numbers were debated at the Nov. 11 school board meeting, Superintendent Andy Holmlund said.
The error, submitted in a budget to county and state officials, indicated the district purchased 10 buses in 2012, which would have been numerically impossible, Holmlund pointed out.
“It was simply a clerical error, and it has been corrected,” Holmlund said.
Much of the Nov. 11 board meeting was spent on a presentation about how the school’s 456-page budget is set, and why the school makes the transportation purchases it does. The presentation was in response to a recent Letter to the Editor and request at a previous school board meeting by County Commissioner Gale Decker.
Per state law, the school superintendent drafts a budget that is reviewed and approved by the school board, the county superintendent of schools, and the county commissioners.
Decker, who has previously served as superintendent of schools, contends the commissioners and county superintendent can’t deny a school district’s budget. He also believes Ronan spends too much on its transportation budget and attacked the number of buses and routes, and depreciation method the district uses.
“I think this fund is abused, and I think it is abused because we can,” Decker said. “I think the voters have no opportunity to vote on it. It ends up in the budget and then it gets put on our property taxes.”
Board chairman Mark Clary said that was untrue.
“I don’t think anyone on this board is trying to stick it to the taxpayer,” Clary said.
Clary pointed out that the school recently refinanced a bond to save taxpayers more than $800,000. Decker called the move a “no brainer.”
Transportation Director Rob Tougas explained the buses are classified to carry 82 passengers, with three elementary-aged children to a seat. There was a bus seat present to demonstrate exactly how big the seats are.
Ronan purchases buses that have a flat front, because small children are much easier to see. Other buses have tall, rounded fronts that reduce visibility.
The district’s buses are highly regulated, Tougas said. The district uses maximum depreciation of the buses so they can be replaced before their warranty expires and the district has to bear the high cost of repairs. Decker claimed the school’s depreciation fund has increased by 349 percent over five years, an amount he thinks is exhorbant to pass on to taxpayers.
Clary said the board has never purchased 10 buses in one year. “We’ve been buying three or four new buses a year to rotate the fleet out and keep quality vehicles on the road,” Clary said. “I don’t want kids of this district riding on a bus on our back roads and stuff. You know, our back roads aren’t the greatest … Back roads aren’t maintained as well as they are supposed to be. Why do we want to put children on a bus that is not capable of safely taking them down these roads? I would rather have newer buses that have more safety features on them, less miles. I don’t want to drive a car that’s got 300,000 miles on it. Why would we do that with our buses?”
Board member Fabian Deneault asked under which capacity Decker was questioning the school’s budget: county commissioner, private citizen, or someone who has been denied a coaching job for the past three years?
Decker said he had a right as a citizen to question how funds were spent.
The discourse then devolved into an unrelated debate about why Decker was denied a coaching position until two points of order brought the conversation to a close.
In other business:
• The board hired Hap Cheff as middle school wrestling coordinator, Monty Cheff as middle school assistant wrestling coach, Angie Redstar as assistant middle school girls basketball coach, Brian Youngren as middle school robotics and annual advisor, and Janey Salomon as middle school librarian. Karen Ryan was hired as a substitute.
• The board approved two budget amendments for the high school and elementary school.
• The board approved a January field trip to Great Falls for high school FFA.
