Edison School Districts $378.2 million Preliminary School Budget 2025-26

 Well, just received this County Super Approved $378.2 million Fiscal Year School Budget for 2025-26.

This Preliminary Budget has appropriations of $378.2 million, which is up $10.9 million (offset by $10.9 million in other revenue) - leaving the School Tax levy the same as last year at $235.0 million.

The School tax rate built into this School Budget is 3.139. Unfortunately, this reduction in the School tax rate of 2.7-cents (over last year's 3.166) is solely due to the increase in the Ratables of $62.9 million - they kept the School tax levy the same as last year.

No $pending Reductions that affect Your School tax rate. So, when they tell you they kept the School tax Rate Flat again, you now know how - and is wasn't due to any reductions they made in their Ridiculous $pending.

Just another Bloated, Out-of-Control $pending Budget that continues to piss away all that State Aid money ($342.9 million over the last 5 years) with these piecemeal projects that won't solve the Biggest Problem facing the School District - we need a New School.

You can see what this School Budget does to Your School taxes in the March 19, 2025 post.

Just some things you need to understand about School Budgets:

• They are prepared on a Fiscal Year Basis (July 1 to June 30)
• They are prepared by the Administration, Reviewed by their Finance Committee and Voted on by the Board to send down to the County Super for approval. You can't see the budget until after it's approved by the County Super and even when the Board puts the Budget up for a vote, it really doesn't matter what the Public thinks, all they need is the County Super's approval.
• They are required to update their Original Budgets on February 1st for actuals. So, when they're comparing the 2025-26 Budget to the 'Revised 2024-25 Budget, they're not comparing it to the Original 2024-25 Budget. By updating to February 1st, you don't get to see what happened or any of the activity that occurred between July 1 and January 31st in these budgets. All that activity is not disclosed to you and any non-budgeted new employees hired, you never see.
• Property taxes are prepared on a Calendar Year Basis so all they do to convert their Fiscal School tax levy is to take half of last years fiscal year school tax levy and half of this years fiscal school tax levy.
• These School Budgets have Salary & Benefits that far exceed half the appropriations yet they fail to show any headcount schedule by position. Last salary file I saw in January 2025, there were some 2,400 employees. Impossible to understand how they can fail to show the employees by position that go along with and whether it supports the salary dollars they're budgeting.
• This School Budget is up for Board approval on April 29, 2025. Once they approve it, they will post the 'User Friendly Budget' (which is not so user-friendly) up on their website. That posting is just a small amount of the full budget and detail they send down to the County Super for approval.

Here's what they sent down for County Super approval - it shows Revenue & Appropriations, Recap of Balances, Capital Projects, Cap Bank calculations, and Employee List and Benefits for the Contracted Employees among other things:

Anyhoo, this is just another in a long-line of Bloated, Out-of-Control $pending School Budgets and you should be concerned what's going to happen when all that State Aid Money Stops coming in - and it will.