U-46 revising 2016-17 budget for final review

Elgin Area School District U-46 officials said this week they are making changes and will present a revised budget for the 2016-17 school year before the school board Aug. 15.

In June, the school board reviewed a tentative $513 million total budget for the 2016-17 academic year, which represents an increase of $5.6 million over the previous year's budget.

At the time, officials said they might have to dip into the district's savings and use about $4.2 million of $88 million in reserves - and consider other funding options - if the state budget crisis remains unresolved.

Since then, state lawmakers have approved a stopgap measure increasing funding for K-12 education by $524 million allowing schools to open on time this fall.

For this fiscal year that ended June 30, U-46 received only 92 percent of what it was owed in general state aid. Officials have said they won't know about any general state aid proration until the end of July - without proration the district could get roughly $5.3 million more in revenue for the fiscal year that began July 1.

The U-46 school board's finance committee will review any changes to the tentative budget Aug. 1.

"Between now and Aug. 15 there is a lot of work to do to finalize the budget," CEO Tony Sanders said.

The budget document will be placed on display Aug. 16 for public review and a hearing is scheduled Sept. 12 before board adoption Sept. 26.