Before presenting the first report of the 2020-21 fiscal year to the Board of Education (BOE) at its August 25 meeting, school district Business Director Ron Bienkowski first offered one final report for the 2019-20 fiscal year.

“This was quite a fiscal year indeed,” Bienkowski said while presenting the year-end financial report for the outgoing fiscal year.

He later shared that the district ended 2019-20 fiscal year in June with a $1,362,451 positive balance, or 1.6 percent of the total 2019-20 approved budget expenditures.

“On the revenue side we were pretty much in line with just about what we were expecting,” he said.

During his report, Bienkowski explained he did not recommend year-end transfers, which would have been typical.

“We traditionally do transfers to bring all line items into a plus or minus $5,000 amount. The problem with this is because there were so many accounts that were underspent,” said Bienkowski, “it wouldn’t be representative of what the final balances were, in my opinion.”

Due to the unprecedented year, the district’s auditors agreed with the decision, according to the business director.

Referring to the $1,362,451 remaining unexpended 2019-20 funds, Bienkowski said, “It is a huge number and I’m sure we could put it to good use considering the additional expenses that are coming up related to COVID and uncertainties in this current fiscal year.”

The report was approved unanimously by the board, which later voted unanimously to request that the Board of Finance deposit the 2019-20 balance into a nonlapsing account for educational purposes and that the intended use of the funds will be to cover unbudgeted COVID-19 pandemic related expenses.

BOE Vice Chair Dan Delia said the board’s Capitol Improvement Plan (CIP) committee recently discussed district cost estimates related to COVID-19, “and it is somewhere around $1.5 million right now. And... we think that number is short. We think it is going to be higher than that [for COVID-19 expenses for the upcoming year].”

Fellow CIP committee member Deborra Zukowski agreed, adding that the estimate was based on the current planned hybrid school model and not on other potential learning models, like distance learning.

Bienkowski said the likelihood that the expenses due to COVID-19 could be more than $1.5 million is “fairly certain.” There are potential offsets, he added, like potential funds from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act.

“I think there is huge potential for variability in this,” BOE Chair Michelle Embree Ku said.

Noting hand sanitizer as one estimated cost the district will face, Delia said, “I just think we should prepare for the worst and hope for the best.”

The school board also unanimously approved the July monthly financial report, marking the first financial report of the 2020-21 fiscal year.

“This lays out the approved budget,” Bienkowski said.

Later he said “there is nothing too significant to report on” for the first month’s expenditures.

The school board also approved two policies, a Pandemic/Epidemic Emergencies policy and a Distance Learning Plan Due to Health and Safety School Closure policy, at the meeting.

A streaming blip occurred within the first hour of the meeting: It was livestreamed at a different web address than had been listed on the meeting’s agenda. Members of the public were also able to listen by phoning in to the meeting.