BOARD APPROVES BALANCED BUDGET; DISTRICT REINSTATES FULL-TIME WASHINGTON SCHOOL PRINCIPAL

The Cape Girardeau Board of Education Monday approved a balanced budget for the 1992-93 school year and named a full-time interim principal for Washington Elementary School.

The board met Monday at Franklin Elementary School and approved a $19.3 million budget. Barbara Blanchard was named Washington school principal.

Business Manager Larry Dew said a retirement incentive program and a $1.3 million budget reduction package adopted last year made the balanced budget this year possible.

"A year ago, you approved a budget spending $1.1 million more than was received," Dew said.

In this year's budget, expenditures equal receipts in the teachers fund and the incidental fund, the two major portions of the district's budget.

Dew explained that in the building fund, expenditures are higher than receipts because of long-range planning activities, including costs for an architectural firm. The difference is made up from balances in that fund.

"This is a hard budget to get to because of the reductions last year," said Superintendent Neyland Clark.

Board member Pat Ruopp said, "I think we have something here to be very proud of. We did something very difficult, balancing the budget.

"We had to cut programs and take a step backwards. That's a very hard thing to do," he said. "But we cut our budget in an effort to balance our budget and within one year's time our budget is balanced.

"In light of some problems in our country, balancing a budget and sticking to it is very hard to do, and we've done it in Cape Girardeau."

Clark said that about 65 percent of Cape Girardeau's budget is generated locally, while the state funds about 27 percent. He said that in most school districts comparable to Cape Girardeau, state and local funding is reversed.

The superintendent said that 80 percent of the budget is personnel costs.

"Of that 80 percent, the bulk of expenditures are going to regular instruction programs," Clark said. "In the last couple years, we have made a significant effort to support regular instruction."

On the average in 1991, Missouri schools spent about 38 percent of their budgets for regular classroom instruction. For AAA-rated schools and those districts with assessed valuation of $45,000 or greater like Cape Girardeau the average also was 38 percent.

But in Cape Girardeau in 1991, 44 percent of the budget was earmarked for classroom instruction, Clark said.

"Concerning the fat cats at the board office you always hear you are heavy at the top you can see you are fairly competitive in terms of administration," Clark added.

The percentage of Cape Girardeau's budget spent on general administration has been 4 percent during the past three years, but declined to 3 percent in the new, 1992 budget. The state average has been 5 percent since 1989.

Clark and Dew both cited facility acquisition and debt service as budget trouble areas. Facility acquisition refers to any purchase for maintenance of a building.

In school districts of similar wealth to Cape Girardeau, the percentage of the budget for facility acquisition has been rising since 1989 from 7-10 percent.

But Cape Girardeau's budget percentage has shrunk, from 3 percent in 1989 to 1 percent the past two years.

"What that shows is that larger schools have begun the process of replacing and upgrading facilities," Clark said.

In terms of debt service, many school opt to fund such upgrades by going into debt, while Cape Girardeau schools have been debt free since 1990.

In other business, Richard Bollwerk the director of elementary education who was named part-time principal at Washington School as part of last year's budget cuts recommended to Clark that a full-time principal be named at Washington.

When the budget cut was made last spring, administrators did not anticipate the long-range planning activities now under way in the district.

"The trouble I was having was with long-range planning at the school," Bollwerk said. "A principal needs to be thinking about things next week and next month. I was doing the job on a day-to-day basis."

Bollwerk said prior to making the recommendation he consulted with the staff at Washington and parents at the school. He said teachers and parents seemed comfortable with Blanchard as interim principal.

Blanchard is a senior teacher at Washington and has administrative certification. Since Bollwerk was named part-time principal, she has served as principal when district administrative duties took him away from the school.

In March or April, the district is expected to begin a search process for a permanent principal at the school.