5 takeaways from the Sioux Falls School District's proposed 2020 budget

As the Sioux Falls School District prepares for the next school year, Superintendent Brian Maher said that, after 2020, the district of nearly 25,000 students will no longer be able to dip into its fund balance and shift funds around to make ends meet. 

The district's school board approved a tentative budget at Monday night's school board meeting, with a final budget expected to be approved in July. 

Not being able to "bank" on the fund balance could mean the district will need to make some tough choices and reassess programs and practices as today's students' needs become more complex, Maher wrote in a letter about the proposed budget. 

Here are the top five takeaways from this year's plan:

1. A 1.8 percent overall increase

While South Dakota offered a 2.5 percent increase to state education funding, in reality, that only meant a 1.8 percent increase to the Sioux Falls School District, Maher said. 

That's because the district had to take into account a 0.7 percent increase of one-time money that was received last year. Overall, that did little to fill the gaps made after years of inadequate state funding, Maher said in his letter. 

Because of this, the district's expected to see a salary and benefit shortfall of $1.4 million in it's general fund, and a $422,840 salary and benefit shortfall in special education.

"If we're going to keep our salaries moving and keep covering our benefits as well, we've got to find efficiencies every year," business manager Todd Vik said. "This year was a process of that."

2. $185,768 less spent on special education

To tighten the belt, so to speak, the district's heaviest reductions will be made to its Coordinated Early Intervening Services, services offered to those who are not yet on individualized education plans for special education, Vik said. 

The program was about $1 million, but those funds will be replaced by federal funds for the district's new reading program, Vik said.

The special education budget will also be reduced to support the ongoing increase in educational assistant compensation instead, according to Maher's budget report. The district had a 21 percent increase to educational assistants in 2019, but now that amount must be fully absorbed into the 2020 budget. In 2019, that was offset by lowering the special education budget. 

3. Salary increases for all employee groups

Despite the 1.8 increase, the district's proposing to give a 2.75 percent salary increase to all employee groups as a means to stay relevant in a competitive labor market, Maher's letter states.

The district is also absorbing a majority of its medical insurance inflation, which is projected at 4.6 percent versus 1.8 percent received in state aid increase. That means $2 million more for staff in the general and special education funds for 2020, the letter states.

4. Reductions to Pre-K and full-time employee allocation adjustments

The district will be reducing the number of 3-year-old students its Pre-K programs serve, but will continue to serve more 1,000 Pre-K students. It will also reduce the number of education assistants in middle school Career and Technology Education classes because of a more simplified curriculum, Maher's letter states. 

The district will also be eliminating small stipends paid to one person in each building acting as a tech integrationist, because technology is becoming second nature, and it will be removing RISE special education students from a building's total student count because full-time employee funds are already assigned through special ed, Maher's letter states. 

"We honestly looked for things that were kind of nice to have, but not critical," Vik said. "When you're looking at efficiencies, that's what comes first."

5. Newly funded items for 2020

The district will start a junior kindergarten program at two elementary schools: Harvey Dunn and Susan B. Anthony. Hayward Elementary and Rosa Parks Elementary will also host the first dual immersion programs for native Spanish speakers starting next school year. And the district is expected to expand its SIPPS reading intervention program to support more struggling readers in elementary grade levels, the letter states.

The district started the new $300,000 reading program at the beginning of the school year to replace a $1.4 million program that wasn't producing positive results. 

"So far, and it's still preliminary, we're excited about what we're seeing there," Maher said. "We're talking about reading, we're talking about comprehension. We're talking about those basic skills we want kids to have. We're seeing that intervention time really paying dividends, so we're looking to scale that up."

He said it's too early to tell if the district has found the magic bullet, but that the program right now makes sense for Sioux Falls students. 

The expansion is not directly connected to a proposed plan to reduce the amount of class time spent in fine arts course at the elementary level next year to relieve chaotic teaching schedules, Maher said. 

"To have that (additional) intervention time available would really be helpful," Maher said. "The SIPPS program isn't driving that change. If we stay with the same schedule we have right now, we should still see benefits from the implementation of the SIPPS program to a wider degree than we have it today."

Overall, the district's expected to have $175.4 million in revenue, and about $176.2 million in expenses for the proposed 2020 budget.