Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

Nevada approves budget

Getting a budget for the 2005-2006 school year together and getting it to the state on time required the Nevada School Board to have a special meeting.

The Board met Tuesday, Sept. 13, to approve the budget, which had to be in by Sept. 15. The Nevada School District will have an operating budget of $3,030,000 for the year, but may have to make more cuts because of anticipated increases in natural gas costs next winter.

Rick McAfee, Nevada superintendent, said there were several cuts made to trim the budget down. Last year five master level teachers retired and were hired by teachers with bachelors degrees. This shaved more than $100,000 from the budget. Attempts were also made to trim the expenses for maintenance and transportation.

On paper, McAfee said, it shows well be able to end the year with $2,000 more than we started. But, this doesnt include any unexpected expenses.

He told the Board the overall budget included the operation budget, the school improvement plan budget and the federal and special education budgets. Theyre all tied into improving test scores and learning.

McAfee said Nevada is giving children a quality education, adding the teachers, administration, drivers and aides work to the fullest of their abilities every day to give every child in the district the best education they can. The state put us in a dangerous situation by cutting our funds. The state should give enough money so districts can meet the standards and salary schedules. The state should fund education and make the Boards job easier.

However, he said, this budget does meet all standards required, but the cost of new air conditioning and diesel fuel will be tremendous.

Earlier in the meeting Jim Cross, transportation and maintenance director, said after the first of the year all heating and air conditioning units must be a minimum of 13 SEER rated. Its a federal law and will hurt us. We have 8-10 SEER in this building.

In other business McAfee said the district will be visited by the North Central Association April 18, 2006. Nevada, he told the Board, has been NCA accredited since its inception and one of the first in the area to be 100 percent accredited. Both the high school and primary school are accredited through the NCA.

Nevada, he said, will be implementing after school tutoring in the fall and spring and will work with the JEDI and JEDI Jr. programs. This is a computer-based system students can access off the Internet at home. The programs keep up with the work students do on-line and prints out reports in January and May showing which programs students accessed and how they progressed.

McAfee said this is expensive, costing $20,000 for two years, but Nevada is part of the pilot program and will get the first two years at no cost. The programs are to enhance math, language art and writing skills.

Four members of the Nevada golf team qualified for the regional tournament in El Dorado. These four are freshmen, McAfee said, and he looks forward to them getting better and improving their scores. We could see a state title by the time they graduate.

Nevada has 422 students at this point, but lost several because of available government housing in surrounding towns. There is no government or low-cost housing in the Nevada district.

This means its free and reduced lunch students who have left. The district could lose $248,000 next year in federal funds if it cant meet the 70 percent figure of students on the free and reduced lunch program.

The odd thing, though, is, while the funds are earmarked, none can be spent on food or improving the lunch program. It can be spent on tutoring and other things directly affecting students.