The Aug. 4 meeting of the Windsor Unified School District Board of Trustees only has one major agenda item, but it is a critical one — the 45-day revise of their annual budget.
The state’s Education Code requires districts to revise their budget “not later than 45 days” after the Governor signs the Annual Budget Act. The 2020-21 Budget Act was signed by Governor Newsom on June 29; therefore, school districts have until Aug. 13 to approve a revised budget. This budget revision reflects the impact of the adopted state budget upon the district’s budget.
This particular revise is critical this year, after confusion and uncertainty surrounded the entire budget process due to the financial strain of the COVID-19 pandemic caused the governor to threaten massive budget cuts to schools.
The governor has rescinded his cuts, mostly, and the federal government has stepped in with CARES funding for schools, giving the Windsor budget a boost of just over $5.6 million, staving off the worst of the cuts discussed in previous meetings.
However, the district is still deficit spending, and while it’s three-year ending fund balance is much healthier, long-term cuts meant to end the era of deficit spending may still be in the works.
The full agenda can be found at https://go.boarddocs.com/ca/windsorusd/Board.nsf/Public including a spreadsheet showing the changes in the district’s financial situation and multi-year projections.
The adjustments apply to both Cali Calmecac and the district.
Open session will start at 6:00pm, this meeting will be held via Zoom and streamed live to the WUSD Facebook and the WUSD YouTube Channel at the following links:
https://www.facebook.com/WindsorUnified/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTC8qiAOAh8Qd77KSW7c8wA
Any public comment should be sent to Jen Cox ([email protected]) by 4 p.m. on Tuesday, Aug. 4.
