Central Lee settles levy at $11.01

BUDGET MISNOMER

I will continue to say this until I retire in any district. People believe that property taxes are the number one provider of revenue for our school district and, in most cases, that is actually false.”

Dr. Andy Crozier, Central Lee Superintendent

DONNELLSON – Central Lee approved their next fiscal year budget Tuesday morning at the district’s regular board meeting in Donnellson.
The Central Lee Community School District will be issuing property taxes at $11.01/$1,000 of taxable evaluation. Superintendent Dr. Andy Crozier said that figure is down about 15 cents from preliminary calculations because the state is picking up eligible districts’  budget guarantee portion of their respective costs this year.
According to the budget document provided at Tuesday’s hearing, the district will be collecting slightly more than $4.7 million, which is up about $70,000 from 2026’s re-estimated figures. The district’s tax ask has increased about 1.7% since fiscal year 2025. The district will have a beginning balance of $5.3 million, which is down about $1.6 million from the start of this fiscal year.
“I knew there were questions here and I knew the state was probably going to pay (budget guarantees) for this year based on the conversations we’ve had,” Crozier said.
He said the line items on the budget including instruction costs, which are projected at $11.4 million this year, are maximum allowed spending. There are also budgeted costs for facility operations, maintenance, transportation administration, and support services. There is $1 million in construction budgeted, along with $868,000 in debt service and $325,000 in Area Education Agency spending. The total expenditures along with revenues will leave the district with a $3.67 million ending balance.
"You could  look at that and say 'wow, that's a lot of dollars', but those are maximum figures,” Crozier said.
“So what we're saying to our community is we're not going to overspend any of these categories or each of these line items. That's not actually the real line item. The real line item budget would be lower than that but this gives the board and the district some padding if for some reason 50 kids move into the district and you’d have to hire some staff or some other rare occurrence happens,” he said.
“So, people always look at it and say that's how much we're spending in a given year. The document doesn't actually portray that. Those numbers are reflected in the unspent authority budget worksheet, which is finalized after we close our books in June and then we publish that in September.”
Crozier said that number is available online at the state Department of Management.
He said every year for the last 10 years, he’s published a financial health document on the district’s website. He said that details the specific dollars spent, how it impacts spending authority, and the dollars received in property tax revenue, the dollars received in miscellaneous income, through open enrollment, and through state aid.
Crozier said out of those three revenues, property tax is the third highest.
“I will continue to say this until I retire in any district. People believe that property taxes are the number one provider of revenue for our school district and, in most cases, that is actually false,” he said.
“In our case, it’s our third highest. State aid is probably the largest revenue source for any district and for us, because we have a significant amount of open enrollment, that generates more dollars than our property taxes. So that’s something to think about when someone else is in this seat,” he said.
The board approved the budget with a 5-0 vote.