When the initial budget is prepared for the Wright City R-II School District in June each year, there are often many unknowns.

At the March meeting of the district’s Board of Education, Veronica Klaus, Director of Finance, clarified those ambiguities as the board passed budget amendment No. 2 by a unanimous 7-0 vote, paving the way for financial clarity through a series of revised figures.

“When we write the budget in June, it’s made on assumptions, based on estimates,” Klaus said. “As the year progresses, we receive new information – enrollment, utility bills, assessed value. Since we have that information, we’re recommending a budget amendment.”

According to the revised budget from Klaus, the district had revenue of $49,179,205.32 and expenditures of $37,618,080.56, leaving a surplus of $11,561,124.76.

Klaus said that there are some newer sources of income for the district this year.

“We’re increasing revenues, approximately $2.3 million,” Klaus said. “A majority of that, more than $12 million, is due to receiving bond money from the gym. We’re increasing the county revenue by over $100,000 due to railroad and utilities. State funding increased by about $135,000 due to the current SAT funding.”

The district has also increased its expenses by $1.5 million, Klaus said.

“We are decreasing salary and benefits,” Klaus said. “That’s due to unfilled positions and moving some of the salary into contracted services. $465,000 of our professional services is going up due to IEP (Individualized Education Program) services.”

She added that, with a handful of new students moving into the district, costs have increased.

“With tuition and transportation, there is an additional cost for that,” Klaus said.

Klaus added that the capital projects budget has increased to $872,386.20.

“That’s due to what we’re going to spend on the construction of the performance gym within this school year,” Klaus said.

Board President Austin Jones asked for clarification on the dollar figure regarding the performance gym.

“There was a board question about the $872,000,” Jones said. “We just need it to be crystal clear that the project is not increasing by that much.”

“When we wrote the budget in June, we hadn’t gotten any of the bond money, we hadn’t gone with a draw schedule, we hadn’t gone with a contractor,” Klaus replied. “The gym was never written in in June. There is no increase to the project.”

In the operations budget, expenses of $30,830,364 exceeded revenue of $30,625,917 – for a difference of roughly $204,347.

“This was based on revenue and expenses through February,” Klaus said. “Revenue and expenses can change in this next quarter. We’ll have closer to the actual numbers in June.”

When the budget was written in June, the district was projected to have a fund balance of 25.01 percent, but that actual figure is currently at 23.04 percent.

“That is still over the board’s goal of 22 percent,” Klaus said.