After months of financial updates from Superintendent Jacque Cowherd, the Fulton School Board approved its Fiscal Year 2013 Budget during a special budget meeting Wednesday night.
Cowherd started off by reviewing several of the expenditure assumptions upon which the budget is based, including: An overall salary increase of 2.6 percent; reduction of the health insurance deductible from $2,500 to $2,000; maintaining transportation and general operating expenditures at FY 2012 levels; a 10-percent increase in utilities; and non-bond issue capital expenditures that include $100,000 for technology, a school bus, a maintenance vehicle and miscellaneous equipment.
As usual, the biggest expenditures for 2013 are salary and benefits, which account for a combined $14.67 million. Local funding is budgeted at $9.51 million; county funding at $373,349; state funding at $7.2 million; and federal funding at $1.72 million.
"We believe we'll be around 29 percent (operating fund balance) this year, hence the recommended salary increase and health insurance adjustment," Cowherd said. "We think even with the salary increase, we're going to end 2012-13 in the 23-24 percent range."