The Warren County School District’s budget has been rising dramatically for the last 10 years.

Since the 2012-2013 school year the budget has gone from $65 million to the $93 million approved in June.

The $7 million increase from 2021-2022 to 2022-2023 represents nearly one-quarter of that 10-year increase.

Expenditures had risen prior to that span, but at a much slower rate. The budget for the 2005-2006 school year, the earliest maintained on the school board’s portion of the district website, shows expenditures of $62 million.

REVENUE

The district is drawing down almost $3 million of its fund balance to balance the budget in 2022-2023.

Anticipated revenues are about $90.6 million.

About $50 million (55 percent) of the district’s revenue comes from state sources and another $13 million (14 percent) is from the federal government.

The local effort reflects about 31 percent of the total revenue — just over $20 million in local real estate taxes and almost $8 million from all other local sources.

The local property tax rate has increased over 10 years, but at a far lower rate than the increase in expenditures. In 2012-2013, the local millage rate was 50.9658. The rate approved for 2022-2023 was 55.3371.

A mill of taxes generates about $400,000 for the district. A change of almost five mills brings the district about $2 million in new dollars.

The district traditionally receives the bulk of its revenues from the state and the percent of the budget from state sources was 55 percent in both 2012 and 2022. The portion of the revenues from the federal government has gone from 5 percent to 14 percent over 10 years, and the local effort dropped from 40 to 31 percent.

In 2012, the local share was about $26.3 million.

ENROLLMENT

Far from matching the increases of either the expenditure budget or the millage, the district’s enrollment has steadily decreased over the years.

In 2012-2013, the district had an enrollment of 4,677 students.

This year, there are 3,875 (a decrease of 17 percent) at seven school buildings — two that serve students in grades K through 12, two dedicated elementary schools, a middle school, a middle-high school, and a high school — in four attendance areas.

Dividing the expenditure budget by the number of students yields a per-student expenditure rate of $13,897 for 2012-2013 and $24,086 this year.

PERSONNEL

The bulk of the district budget, almost two thirds of it, goes to paying people — salaries and benefits eat up about $60 million.

Superintendent Amy Stewart, who is the highest-paid employee of the district at $155,239 in 2020-2021, was not on the openpagov.org list showing top 93 highest paid school officials in the state. The lowest pay on that list was $157,944. The highest was $325,245.

According to openpagov.org, three other district employees — two central office administrators and a building administrator — had salaries over $100,000 for 2020-2021, eight more — five building administrators and three from central office — were over $90,000, and another five — four building administrators and one central office administrator — made $80,000 or more. The district had 16 employees making between $70,000 and $80,000 that year.

The highest-paid teachers made just short of $70,000 in 2020-2021.

The list of employees making over $60,000 but less than $70,000 includes more than 200 names and is dominated by teachers, though there are specialists, building administrators, guidance, and others among them.

There were about 100 teachers making between $50,000 and $60,000 in the district in 2020-2021.

The lowest teacher salary for the year was $44,070, and about 45 school employees made from that amount to $50,000.

For the 2012-2013 school year, personnel represented an even larger portion of the budget. The $45 million dedicated to salaries, wages, and benefits was almost 70 percent of the budget.

Personnel isn’t the only expenditure on the rise.

Other multi-million-dollar changes in the budget over 10 years include technology — up about $2 million; and debt-service — more than double from $3.37 million to $7 million.