A Columbus Municipal School District board member’s effort to establish a paid citizen advisory committee to help with the school budgeting process hit a snag on Monday.
Trustee Jason Spears created a charter — establishing the purpose and scope of the committee — and presented it at the board meeting Monday night. The charter included compensation for committee members.
Board counsel David Dunn wants to first seek an attorney general’s opinion about the legality of the proposed committee charter, especially the legality of paying members of a trustee-appointed committee.
“I found no authority, (attorney general) opinions or clear statutory opinions for the payment to a trustee-appointed advisory committee. … I would recommend that you would allow me to request an attorney general’s opinion on that to see if compensation can be paid,” Dunn said.
Dunn said modifications to the charter should also include the Open Meetings and Open Records acts be applied. He also advised the committee to have a lawyer present at each meeting if the committee is established.
“There’s just a whole bunch of moving parts that I just feel like you would want to table this until we get an opinion on the compensation and give us some time to give you something, the trustees, in writing on what we feel like will need to be done to make this charter 100 percent legal.”
The committee charter states each member will receive $20 per hour but not exceed $40 per month. Meetings, which would be scheduled once a month, would last two hours.
Spears said he offered to reallocate the $200 he receives each month for serving on the board of trustees to pay for committee member compensation.
Purpose of the committee
The purpose of the five-person committee, which would be appointed by trustees, is to work with the superintendent, business office and school board to offer recommendations, insights and factual findings to the board for consideration for the 2017-18 budget.
Spears said his idea to establish the committee stems from what he saw as a lack of communication and information sharing between CMSD administration and the board and taxpayers. He also wants community involvement in the budgeting process to help “exhaust all areas of evaluation.”
The committee is expected to report to the board each month with a summary of items discussed and each member’s suggestions or recommendations.
Superintendent Philip Hickman said it is his and his staff’s responsibility to formulate a budget for the school district and present it to the board for approval, but he supports forming an advisory committee.
“I serve at the pleasure of the board, and we want to make sure they feel comfortable being informed any way possible,” Hickman said. “I believe in my staff, and I believe that the budget we recommend is a good budget. But if members of the board feel they need a second assurance, we serve at the pleasure of the board.”
The meetings
According to the charter, meetings are to be held each month between February and May — a prime time for budget considerations before the board of trustees holds budget hearings in July, Spears said.
Committee members are expected to identify and evaluate local, state and federal revenues for the 2016-17 budget, revenue trends for the past two budget cycles, common budget expenditure trends for the past two budgets, one-time budget expenditures for 2015-16/2016-17, sole-source purchases for 2015-16/2016-17, major increases in spending, major decreases in revenues and opportunities for cost reduction and increasing revenue within CMSD.
Spears said the budget has to be approved after the governor signs off on funding for the school year and before the deadline to submit it to the city for funding.
“We tend to try to have everything done by Aug. 15, because that’s when we have to have everything submitted to the city and our budget filed with the state.”
He said ending the meetings in May gives the board time to hear and consider the committee’s recommendations.
“This way it gives ample time for everybody involved in the process to have open discussions and be able to make decisions that will help us outline the way we need to proceed.”
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