By: Elizabeth Schroeder
With an unclear understanding of what actually went wrong with North Butler finances, the board voted. On November 4, North Butler’s School Board made a decision to approve a plan promising financial security to our district through savings available after closure of the Greene Elementary Building. Following this plan, would result in improvement in educational achievement and opportunities for all students.
Where are the savings at as of now? North Butler’s 3-year old program has been cut for approximately $15,000 savings. Better educational opportunity for whom? Did we reduce a secretary position? No. Did we hire more teachers? Yes. Do our children have adequate space to learn at the Allison Elementary Building? No. Were you aware the classroom that will be used for Pre-Kindergarten is about half the size allotted in previous years? Staff members looked into getting a loft due to lack of space for the state-mandated sensory areas.
Fixing up the Greene Elementary Building was way too expensive. We would need to add new controls for heating system (not too costly) and windows (around $7,000 for areas in need).
Here are a few of the building expenses approved by board over the last few months.
Allison Building: Drainage for the parking lot $6,862.50, Asphalt for Parking lot: $63,513.60, Sidewalk widening $10,800, Fortinet Security $4,325.93, Playground $87,500, Video Cameras both schools $106,895, Entry at High School $17,660, and Concession stand up to $120,000. Technology purchases: I pads $78,965 and Chromebooks for 15-16 FY $35,528.75. These expenses total over $530,000.
What about adding hooks or lockers so each child would have their own space? Did you know Kindergarteners are expected to share a locker this upcoming school year? How about making sure projectors meet the teacher’s needs to educate our children? Some projectors in Allison Building do not support audio function which is vital to some class lessons. What about moving playground equipment from Greene Elementary to reduce unnecessary expenditures?
Did you know there were issues with management of funds? What was the real issue to start with? Did you know that the state is in the process of performing an audit of North Butler’s finances? The citizens of the North Butler school district filed a petition with state to find answers. We will have answers.
Here is a post from Superintendent Foster’s blog: A lack of oversight and financial controls falls back on the superintendent’s office. It is currently my responsibility and mine alone to set proper oversight and controls in place.
An excerpt from the IASB “What to Look for in School Board Candidates”: School boards are the fiscal stewards of taxpayer dollars. They provide important oversight to ensure the taxpayers’ investments in education have the most impact for the least cost.
Is the North Butler Board really on the right path? We can change this. Vote for a new board.
Teach kids to share at an early age…. even Kindergarteners.
The author of this Op Ed obviously has some issues and concerns that need to be addressed. And since this forum is for North Iowa I can understand why the Editor accepted this piece. But really folks, this isnt the place to go to get anything resolved. A more appropriate avenue might be The Iowa Department of Ed, Arbitration or following the grievance procedure outlined by the district. I feel your pain but cant do a darn thing about it.
The negative comments that will come on here must be from Allison! There is room to add on in Greene plus parking!!! We need to keep on this without the support of the board in case you didnt know, they did not do a thing to keep this in Greene!! And I signed my name
Add on to the Allison school, at least they have the room to do it. Greene sure does not have room, they dont even have a parking lot without walking a block or more.
There is parking all around the school and off-street. Where’s the parking at Allison? That school is pretty much in the same boat.
That town died years ago
The problem with these so called boards that are suppose to monitor what’s happening … Is they don’t …. They just rubber stamp what the managers want. The whole system is broke. In other areas of state government its worse. Managers abusing tax payer money. Happens every day.
I think they need to remove the board and put people in that have some !!!! to stand up for our elementary. Take the money and fix our school!! You wait the next step they will take is to add on to their school!! People wake up!! Allison is noted for over spending and it wont change until people wake up!!!
Wasn’t it Greene that was broke when they merged?