SAUSD Budget Update
Page Navigation
-
Assistant Superintendent, Business Services
2019-20 Budget Message
We are excited to present the 2019-20 Budget for the District. The Budget reflects the goals of the District as outlined by the Board of Education. The District has implemented multiple programs to improve student outcomes and enhance the safety and security in 2018-19 and prior years. Even with the projected decrease in Revenue in 2019-20, the District plans to enhance and consolidate the programs and ensure that the gains in student outcomes are not compromised by expenditure reductions. The District is maintaining the same level of staffing in the Budget Year and implementing new programs like the full day Kindergarten to ensure success for early education.
The District’s revenue projections are reflective of the K-12 revenues contained in the May Revision of the Governor’s 2019 Budget Proposal as well as the projected student enrollment for the 2019-20 school year.
The May Revision reflects lower State General Fund revenues below the January estimates for 2019-20 by $63.9 million due to changes in average daily attendance and cost of living adjustments, bringing the projected Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) funding to a total of $1.959 billion. The following factors, presented in the Governor’s May Revision proposal, were utilized to build our 2019-20 Adopted Budget:
- The Local Control Funding Formula;
- The State’s K-12 Revenue Allocation;
- The current Department of Finance revenue assumptions; and
- The COLA rate of 3.26%.
District Projections
Santa Ana Unified projects a decrease in overall ongoing funding in the adopted budget primarily due to declining enrollment projections. The District continues to project an ongoing enrollment loss of 1,590 students in 2020-21 and 2021-22. As the LCFF is fully funded in 2018-19, the District will receive a cost of living adjustment only in the out years. Taking into consideration of these two factors, the District projects an ongoing loss in LCFF funding in the out years. The 2019-20 adopted budget projects an unrestricted ending fund balance of $53.94 million.
SAUSD Long-range Planning
This budget is a numerical depiction of the Santa Ana Unified School District’s academic program and strategic Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP) goals as well as fiscal solvency. Our four LCAP goals, developed through our LCAP stakeholder input, include 1) Teaching and Learning, 2) Engagement, 3) School Climate and Safety, and 4) Targeted Support.
The District continues to monitor and plan for long-range external pressures that will result in increased costs such as contribution to employee health & welfare insurance benefits as well as employee retirement contributions (STRS and PERS), Other Post Employment Benefit Obligations (OPEB), technology refresh, textbooks adoptions, negotiated labor cost, routine and deferred maintenance and other items.
While the District has demonstrated the ability to manage these and other costs through the 2021-22 school year with expenditure adjustments, we continue to monitor projected changes in future years. The goal is to ensure efficient District operations and services while maintaining fiscal solvency. Ultimately, budget and programmatic priorities for new or redirected dollars are determined by the Board of Education with considerable input by our community stakeholders through the LCAP process. The District acknowledges that it will have to reduce ongoing expenditures by $43 million in 2020-21 to ensure fiscal solvency.
This budget will be adopted according to statute, prior to June 30, 2019. Once the State Budget is adopted, a revision of this budget including revenue assumptions will be presented in conformance with the Education Code, if necessary.
Manoj Roychowdhury, Assistant Superintendent, Business Services