Even after 27-years of covering public education, there are still things that I see and hear that can surprise me. I’ve heard every excuse under the sun for poor student performance in math and science. I’ve heard endless excuses for kids missing as much as 20% of class days and still getting passed on to the next grade. I’ve even had to do stories on school board members creating fake social media profiles in an effort to subvert a referendum campaign. But a recent meeting of the Oshkosh School Board featured an admission from an administrator that I just could not believe.
During an update on the current budget and district spending, it was revealed that Oshkosh is on the way to a two-million dollar budget deficit this year. That wasn’t the big surprise–schools seem to run over-budget a lot nowadays. What was shocking is that when asked why the deficit was so high just midway through the budget year, Executive Director of Business Services Drew Niehans admitted publicly that it was due to intentional under-estimation of expenses.
Niehans told school board members that the budget they approved last October was not an accurate plan for spending. The example that Niehans presented was the district’s transportation budget–where he stated their deal with Lamers includes a built-in 3% annual increase throughout the term of the contract. The problem is, that Niehans never includes that increase in the transportation budget. He simply plugs in the same number, year after year, knowing full well THAT WILL NOT BE WHAT THE DISTRICT WILL ACTUALLY SPEND FOR BUSING STUDENTS!!
Niehans tried to justify this practice by noting that the school board must approve a “balanced budget” by state law–and grossly under-estimating known expenses is the “only way” to get the budget to balance. I had to rewind the meeting video just to make sure that I had heard that part correctly, because a reporter doesn’t want to accuse one of the largest school districts in the state of producing a sham budget just to meet a state requirement without corresponding audio proof. Niehans also copped to underestimating personnel expenses as well, again, to “balance the budget”.
Despite my 27-years of covering public education, and what I have learned about urban district school boards, I still expected at least one member of the Oshkosh board to express some concern or indignation about this deceptive practice–but there was not a peep about an admission of financial malfeasance. Instead, members expressed confidence that “right sizing” district operations would bring an end to that practice.
The irony of that update is that it comes at a time when Oshkosh School Board members are making it a priority to “regain the trust of residents” following the aforementioned fake social media accounts scandal, the purchase of multiple residential properties adjacent to the current South Park Middle School to use for construction of a new consolidated southside middle school–only to find out that zoning restrictions tied to nearby Wittman Regional Airport made that nearly impossible (which no one in district administration bothered to check on until it was too late), and multiple reports of bad student behavior in the new Vel Phillips Middle School on the northside of town. So how does putting out a budget that you know is absolute BS help to foster increased trust with taxpayers?
Speaking of timing, that story was followed shortly by a report in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that the Milwaukee School District finished its last budget year with a $46-million deficit. While that alone would be cause for concern, the paper reported that the deficit “came as a surprise to district officials” as they “weren’t expecting to run a deficit last year”. It was also noted that the deficit was not discovered by those working in the district’s finance office–but rather by auditors called in to look at the books after the school year was done.
The J-S article notes that when the Glendale-River Hills School District ran into a “surprise deficit” of $2.7-million in 2024, the superintendent and the finance director resigned immediately. In Milwaukee, Superintendent Brenda Cassillius told the reporter that it was “too soon to say” if any heads should roll in her administration. Chief Financial Officer Aycha Sawa did not provide a comment for the story.
Now this revelation comes after MPS nearly lost some of its state funding last year because it could not provide audited financial statements to the Department of Public Instruction years after they were due. Even when threatened with that loss of revenue, the district still could not comply, so the state had to send in help just to catch up on one year’s worth of delinquent reports.
Everyone in the public sector bristles when they are told to operate more like those of us in the private sector. “You can’t run a government like a business!!” is their usual response. And that is true. A private business doesn’t have the power to force its customers to pay for things they don’t even use like a school district can. And there aren’t many businesses that can just print more money to cover their expenses like the federal government does every year.
But accurate budgeting and accounting practices should not be something outside the realm of expectation for local governments. If my monthly bill for phone and internet goes up $8 a month, I don’t pretend like i can just keep paying the price I was before–I have to adjust my personal budget and take cash from somewhere else to account for the increase. To make a budget that only includes what you hope to pay–or what makes it look like you won’t be going into a deficit–isn’t actually making a budget, it’s creating a wish list.
And voters should demand that the financial stewards that they elect every year–school board members–are asking much more probative questions around budget time about the accuracy of the package they are approving. Too many of those sitting in those seats have forgotten that most-important role, believing instead that they are supposed to just be “cheerleaders for the district” or the “voice of the marginalized”. Appearing to care about accuracy of budgets, proper tracking of spending, addressing shortfalls as they are taking place instead of just “taking it from fund balance”, and holding those handling the district’s finances responsible for their errors, those are ways to “rebuild trust with the taxpayers”–not scolding them for not paying enough in state income taxes to come back from Madison.
