The Wayne Highlands School District (WHSD) Board of Directors held a special meeting Friday afternoon to review their annual budget audit for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2017.

The audit was performed by Murphy, Dougherty & Company Certified Public Accountants (CPA).

Present at the meeting were Board President Lothar Holbert, Vice President Gorge Korb, directors Gina Pritchard, Heather Stephens, John Lowe, Brian Weist, Thomas Dirlam, Board Secretary Diane Mott, Business Manager Jeffrey Firmstone, Assistant Business Manager Michelle Gogolski, WHSD Superintendent Gregory Frigoletto and Assistant Superintendent Timothy Morgan.

Presenting the audit was CPA Mike Dougherty from the aforementioned firm.

The audit shows the district was under their revenue budget by just shy of $27,000 and under their expenditure budget by over $240,000.

The district had originally budgeted drawing down their savings by $637,000, allocating for contributions put into the Pennsylvania Public School Employees Retirement System (PSERS).

With the expenditure under-spending listed above, the fund balance was only drawn down by $390,000, netting an ending balance of $9.4 million banked for next year.

Of the balance, $5.5 million has been earmarked for future contributions to PSERS and $200,000 for future health plan obligations.

Dougherty commented the district has traditionally come near to breaking even year after year The Capital Projects fund balance was drawn down by $96,000, leaving a total of $637,000.

The primary factor of the decrease was the recent renovations made to the High School Main Entrance,

Library and Music department which have since been completed.

According to the audit report, outstanding debt for the district, totaling $545,000 at the end of 2018 payments, is on course to be paid off by 2024.

The food service budget ended the year with a net $1.4 million in the hole, down $74,000 from the start of the year.

Dougherty mentioned the number skews high due to regulations requiring the district to include its portion of the PSERS pension liability for food service workers under the department’s budget. “The reality of that liability is, at the present time, nobody’s gonna come knocking looking for that money,” said Dougherty. “That’s a PSERS issue right now … but, as of right now, it doesn’t really have that much of a financial impact.”

Dougherty explained part of the pension liabilities are tabulated into a portion the annual PSERS contribution the district makes.

The liability, in total $1.7 million, needs to be recorded for proper accounting procedure, said Dougherty.

If it were removed, the net loss of $1.4 would instead be a positive number.

The Internal Service fund increased by over $450,000, netting $1.5 million. Combined with the food service fund, total proprietary funds came out to $102,931 for the 2017 budget.

“At the end of the day, I think it’s all positive,” said Dougherty. “I think that’s because of the work that’s gone in for years, the philosophy that’s really been adopted here on a day to day basis ... has this district to be in the position that you’re in.”

Dougherty concluded, “I think the recipe works, so I would say don’t change the recipe at this stage of the game.”

Article Courtesy of:
David Mazzenga
The Wayne Independent