Preliminary 2025-26 school budget presented

CLINTONVILLE – A preliminary budget for the 2025-26 school year, which Clintonville Superintendent Troy Kuhn described as the “roughest of roughest” was presented to the Clintonville Board of Education at its April 14 meeting.
When presenting the preliminary budget, Kuhn stressed that the budget was the result of the administrative team and directors putting all their budgets together to create this first draft of a budget. The budget will be “fine-tuned” in June, and then again in September before the board will be asked to approve a budget in October.
Kuhn said a lot of the things in the preliminary budget are “wish list” items, as well as capital items that can be taken out of the budget.
“If we would propose our wish list right now, it would be an additional $985,000 to this year’s budget,” Kuhn said. “That would be an additional $1.3 million in expenses from previous years.”
He added that some capital projects and the district’s retirement fund were not in previous budgets because of the use of referendum and COVID funds available to the district.

“Eventually the roofs are going to have to get redone, eventually things are going to have to get done, so, either we have to do them, or we kick the can down the road to other years,” Kuhn said. “If we want to be financially responsible, we would start setting money aside for those types of things.”
One item Kuhn mentioned regarding technology is all the district’s computers will need to be updated to Window 11, as support for other versions of Windows will be ending soon. The past few years COVID funds were used for technology upgrades, and referendum funds was used for computer servers for the district. The district has exhausted it’s COVID funds.
The district’s fund to pay for employee retirements will last for up to two years, Kuhn said. After that, the district will need to start budgeting funds for the retirement account.

Revenues
Regarding revenues for the district, Kuhn said the district currently doesn’t know what the property value assessments will amount to and what the equalized value will be for the townships in the district.

Fund 80
Trucker University costs the district around $12,000, while middle school athletics costs the district around $82,000. Kuhn clarified that 40% of Shaun Liesch’s salary is charged to Fund 80 because he is in charge of the middle school athletics. Liesch is the district’s activities director.
The district’s Rec Center runs around a $700,000 annual deficit, Kuhn said. The district receives around $240,000 annually from those using the Rec Center. The expenditures are near $1 million. Almost $500,000 of the expenditures is for personnel.Supplies are around $350,000, and utilities around $100,000.
Dellwood Childcare Center runs around a $400,000 annual deficit, Kuhn said. The total revenue is around $474,000. Expenditures amount to around $1 million, with personnel accounting for almost all of that amount. Supplies are $125,000, with utilities around $20,000.
Future projects for the Dellwood Childcare Center could include installing new tile in the building and replacing the roof. Kuhn said that could cost between $100,000-$300,000 in the next 5-10 years.

Conclusion
Kuhn said he doesn’t know if the district needs an operational referendum.
Board President Ben Huber said the preliminary budget includes future spending that the district will need in order to complete capital projects.
“If you don’t start filling them now, when those bills come due at some point, it may be really difficult to fill,” Huber said.
Kuhn reminded the board that the district does have $3 million in its undesignated fund balance, so it can afford some unexpected expenses.

“It’s not like our checking account has zero in it. Then we would be having a very different conversation,” Kuhn said. “… Even though our fund balance (amount) isn’t meeting our policy, it’s still pretty healthy for a district our size.”