Cullman County Schools Chief School Financial Officer Ed Roberson, right, speaks to the board about the upcoming year’s budget during Thursday’s meeting.

The Cullman County School Board held its first budget hearing for the Fiscal Year 2021-2022 budget on Thursday afternoon, and heard some of the details about next year’s budget from Chief School Financial Officer Ed Roberson. 

Roberson said the system’s general fund —which is the operating fund that includes most of the payroll and bills — is projected to see $88,214,607 in revenues in the coming year.

Around $64 million of that revenue will be coming from the state and $23 million will be coming from local sources, mainly property taxes and sales taxes, he said.

“I’m going to project around $15 million in sales tax this year for our school system.”

For general fund expenditures, the system is expected to spend $84,252,431 by the end of the 2021-2022 fiscal year, with the majority of that ($51.38 million) going toward instructional and instructional support services, or teacher salaries and benefits.

Around $7.75 million will go toward the system’s operations and maintenance and $3 million will go toward the system’s administration — the central office staff and school principals and assistant principals.

Of the $5 million in half-cent sales tax revenues that the system will receive, 60 percent ($3 million) of that will go to instruction and technology, 20 percent ($1 million) will go to local schools and the remaining 20 percent will go to facilities, Roberson said.

The system will also have around $1.5 million in unallocated funding that will be used to pay debt, and it will be paying off one of its bonds in the coming year to free up around $498,000 in additional funding that will go to pay off debt. 

Roberson also spoke about a few of the projects that are included in next year’s budget, including a classroom addition and lunchroom at Hanceville Elementary School, a new media center, offices and gym for Good Hope Middle School and a new gym for Cold Springs High School.  

He said the system will also continue the work to remove window air conditioning units from around the county, and the system will be replacing schools’ current lights with LED lights and upgrading HVAC systems at a few schools across the county. 

“We’ve got big plans over the next two to three years to really get our infrastructure up to where it needs to be,” he said. 

The last few years’ budgets have included projects to install new HVAC systems for the county’s high schools, and those look like they will finally be completed in the coming year, Roberson said.

“Hopefully all of those will be taken care of soon,” he said.

School boards are required to have two public budget hearings before voting on the system’s budget, and the next hearing will be held during the board’s Sept. 9 meeting. 

In other business, the board:

• Approved the rescinding of the following items approved during the board’s Aug. 2 meeting:
• Resignation for Jennifer Brown, Fairview Elementary teacher, effective May 28 (corrected to board leave).
• TEAMS contract (preliminary one year) for Blaise Carie, Vinemont High teacher (decided not to accept the contract).
• Approved the following long-term teacher substitute: Valerie B. Gambrill- effective Aug. 16.
• Approved a request from Cold Springs Elementary/High School to pay Bruce Parker $30 an hour for detention.
• Approved a request to pay from Fairview High School Band Boosters Kristi Harris and Nathan Kilgo $500 for band camp hours outside of contract hours.
• Approved a request from Fairview High School to pay George Redding, Jr. $2,200 for summer mowing and upkeep of fields including fertilizer and spraying, paid by local school funds.
• Approved a request from Fairview High School to pay Ricky McDonald $2,250 for conducting summer girls’ workouts, paid by local school funds.
• Approved a request from Good Hope High School to pay Patrick McDonald $900 for summer weight training, paid by local school funds.
• Approved a request from Vinemont Middle School to pay the following teachers for attending summer training, paid by local school funds:
• Michael Williams- $500 for attending We Build It Better training.
• Mandy Redding- $400 for attending computer science training.
• Laney Looney- $400 for attending computer science training.
• Approved 2021-2022 after school programs and personnel.
• Approved the following requests from the Athletic Supplement Committee:
• Senior High Baseball and Senior High Softball Head Coaches supplement raised to $5,000.
• Senior High Assistant Baseball and Senior High Assistant Softball supplement raised to $2,000 (this position will have to be the JV coach in order to receive this supplement).
• Boys and Girls Track supplement raised to $2,000.
• Added a supplement for Middle School Baseball and Softball in the amount of $1,200 (there is a minimum of 10-game middle school schedule that must be played in order to receive this supplement and it must be an AHSAA declared middle school team).
• Added a supplement for Bowling in the amount of $1,200.
• Added the following supplements for local school Athletic Directors:
• Parkside and Harmony- $500.
• Middle School- $750.
• High School- $1,500.
• Approved to pay select secretaries and front office personnel $100 for district approved summer work, paid by state, local or general funds.
• Approved to pay school nurses their daily rate of pay for Aug. 4 (not a contract day), paid by ESSER funds.
• Approved to pay Becky Burgess for time worked from June 1-30, paid by special education funds.
• Approved an out-of-state field trip request for Hanceville High School to travel to Hot Springs, AR on March 26, 2022.
• Approved June 2021 financial statements.
• Approved June 2021 bills and salaries in the amount of $10,838,962.72.
• The Cullman County School Board will next meet on Sept. 9 in the Central Office Board Room, with a work session beginning at 3:30 p.m. and the meeting immediately following.