In a rare meeting in Eunice, The St. Landry Parish School Board mulled the future of the school system, particularly its buildings and finances during a session at LSUE.
The School Board has called an election on March 24 on two tax proposals. One proposal is a 11.3 mill, 10-year tax to pay for salary increases. The other is a 12.1 mill, 20-year tax to fund a $99 million bond for capital improvements.
The Board has yet to arrive at a plan for the building program and the exact amount of the pay raises also is undetermined. The pay decision is on the agenda of Board’s Finance Committee at 4 p.m. Monday.
Superintendent Patrick Jenkins said outside the meeting in the Acadian Center that the goal is to have a detailed plan in place before the vote occurs.
“You’ll notice this is hard,” he said after Board members heard details about how much it cost to operate its current buildings and discussions about new buildings.
“We are getting closer. Probably we need two or three more of these in January. I think we are going to have something very definite in February,” Jenkins said.
The goal is to improve the school academically as well as its facilities, he said.
The bottom line for the Board was in financial statements presented by Tressa Miller, finance director.
The school system is saddled by expenses such as insurance, maintenance and utilities at schools that are costly to operate, she said. The expenses could be redirected to academics if the district can escape under-utilized schools.
Jenkins said Lafayette Parish has about 30,000 students and operates in about 30 facilities. St. Landry Parish has about 14,000 students and has 37 sites.
One analysis presented at the meeting shows the cost to operate schools versus the $8,355 per student funding from state and local sources.
Schools with the highest cost per student are Arnaudville, $9,677; Center for Academic Programs, $13,958; East, $9,369; North, $10,817; North Central, $11,425; Northeast, $11,16; St. Landry Accelerated Transition School, $12,525; and Washington, $11,650.
The average cost per student is $8,368.
The costs are based on 2013-14 operating data and 2014-15 contract salaries.
Another document lists the age of the school system’s facilities.
Arnaudville Elementary was built in 1922 and is the oldest facility in the district. There have been additions or alterations to the school in 1971, 1975, 1985 and 1987.
The news facility is the St. Landry Accelerated Transition School built in 2005.
Main building dates for Eunice schools are: Central Middle, 1955; East Elementary, $1966; Eunice Career and Technical Center, 1950; Eunice High School, 1966; Eunice Junior High School, 1984; Glendale Elementary, 1960; and Highland Elementary, 1969.
Some documents are on eunicetoday.com with the posting of this story.
Jenkins said St. Landry Parish current millage 20.52 ransk 64th among 69 school districts in the state. The average millage rate for school districts in the state is 45 mills.
A presentation being used by Jenkins states the district revenues by source are $73.9 million, state Minimum Foundation Program; $2.5 million, other state services; $12.5 million property tax; $23.5 million, sales and use tax; and $1.8 million, other local services.
The presentation states there are $117 million in expenses. The expenses include salaries, 55.4 percent; payroll benefits, $31.9 percent; purchased professional services, $2 percent; repairs and maintenance, $1.2 percent; travel, insurance, rental and miscellaneous, 1.7 percent; materials and supplies, 2.8 percent; utilities, 2.6 percent; and bond payments, 2.4 percent.
Jenkins said details about the district’s bond proposals are on its website. There is also a calculator to determine how much the millage would cost.
Community forum meetings have been scheduled at Beau Chene High School, Jan. 17; Eunice High School, Jan. 24; North Central High School, Jan. 31; Northwest High School, Feb. 7; Opelousas High School, Feb. 13; and Port Barre High School, Feb. 21.
All forums start at 6 p.m.
