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McAllen ISD Deputy Superintendent for Business and Operations Lorena Garcia gave a preliminary fund balance report this week for the school year 2023-2024 which included an unprecedented surplus of around $32 million at the end of the year.
“When we came in here we had, last year, a $6 million deficit and then a $14 million deficit this year which was a total of $20 million … but now we can safely say that with this savings we have wiped out the deficit,” MISD Superintendent René Gutiérrez said during the meeting. “This is not counting that we gave everyone a raise … not too many school districts can report these types of finances. We will continue to monitor (the finances) and we would like to give this money back to the kids and to the staff.”
Garcia started by saying the information is typically reported to the school board in November but having a good gauge on the numbers, she said they just could not wait to share the good news.
The presentation gave a preliminary total general fund balance for 2023-2024 which is just over $143 million. It is an increase of about $9 million from 2022-2023.
The unassigned general fund balance is where the district touts its efforts having just over $90 million, an increase of about $32 million in the school year 2023-2024.
The unassigned fund balance is a portion of the district total fund balance that can be used for any purpose that the school board deems fit.
“That’s basically our savings,” Garcia said. “We are recommended by TEA that we have at least 75 days worth of operating expenditures in that savings in case something happens, but we far have exceeded that threshold.”
The money for 75 days of operating expenditures is just over $55 million. In the report, the unassigned fund balance could cover 123 days of operating expenditures in the district.
From 2019 to 2023, the unassigned general fund balance stayed relatively the same at around $56 million to $58 million. The changes in those school years also usually ranged from under a million to between $2 million.
Facing a total of $20 million deficit the previous year and looking into the next year, Garcia said the budget savings committee, the executive cabinet and the superintendent looked for ways to cut back on expenditures.
Some of the ways the district did that was by repurposing money from programs, revamping the selection of staff and reducing 150 positions through attrition with vacancies and no employment terminations. Garcia said it saved the district $7.1 million.
Other ways included software reductions saving $2 million and cutting department budgets by 10%.
A large amount of the increase came from $17 million in ESSER funds being moved into the fund balance.
“This increase is unprecedented in the history of McAllen ISD,” she said the day after. “We have never had that big of a surplus at the end of a fiscal year. Even when you take the $32 million and subtract the $17 million from ESSER, that is still significant.”
The surplus is kept indefinitely in the fund balance for future needs that the board and superintendent deem fit.
“We’re trying to have a healthy fund balance that will allow us to be financially stable for years to come,” Garcia said.
