The Manhasset School District has accrued about $266,000 in unanticipated revenues for the 2014-15 school year as of June 1, according to disclosures released Thursday.
In a presentation detailing the district’s fund balances, Assistant Superintendent for Business Rosemary Johnson said she had initially projected about $430,000 in fund balance revenues, but the number was higher due to unexpected state reimbursement for expenses related to Manhasset’s homeless student population and payments from other districts.
Manhasset recovered $149,000 in homeless aid from the 2013-14 school year, $68,000 from the Oyster Bay School District for the 2008-09 and 2013-14 school years, $17,000 from the New York City School District from 2013-14 and $13,000 from the Herricks School District, according to district documents.
“It’s been an enormous undertaking but we didn’t let go and we finally got what we needed,” Johnson said.
Johnson said the district does not budget for aid related to its homeless student population, as it changes frequently within a school year.
For example, one student who had been homeless received permanent housing in October, Johnson said.
“We never know what’s coming in and we never know what it is,” Johnson said. “It’s very unpredictable.”
Johnson reported approximately $1.7 million in fund balances expenditures, lower than she anticipated, though she said the figure could increase by $50,000 with varying utility costs.
“There are pieces here that are still moving,” she said.
Of Manhasset’s expenses covered by its fund balance, $857,569 worth are for health insurance and retirement benefits, according to district documents.
Despite projecting $2,841,166 in retiree health insurance, the district will only have to utilize $333,530 because 12 of Manhasset’s retirees died during the 2014-15 school year, Johnson said.
“This was above and beyond anything we’d ever seen,” she said, noting the district budgets for such payments on a person-by-person basis.
Since 2009-10, Manhasset has utilized $6,329,698 from its fund balance toward benefits, with about half going toward its teacher retirement system, according to district documents.
In the last two years, the district has adopted the state’s benefit stabalization plan — through which it may spread payments for employees and teachers over a few years — as state contribution requirements have spiked in recent years.
Manhasset deferred $1.32 million in 2013-14 and $1.837 in 2014-15 as part of the program, and the district will participate in the program again despite its teacher contribution percentage not meeting the program’s benchmark, according to district documents.
If Manhasset did not participate in the next year, it would lose eligibility to utilize the stabalization program in future years.
