The Madison Metropolitan School District provides a variety of programs and services through an administrative department called Madison School and Community Recreation. The State Legislature provided statutory authority for local school boards to establish a community service fund and removed it from revenue limit control starting in the 2000-01 school year. This Community Service Fund, commonly referred to as Fund 80, is used to account for activities such as adult education, community recreation programs, non-special education preschool, day care services and other programs which are not elementary and secondary educational programs but have the primary function of serving the community. The district adopts a separate tax levy for the fund. The State Department of Public Instruction provides no oversight of local school program inclusions in Fund 80, nor provides for any state level audit or accountability for tax levies and other sources of revenue.

Parents, taxpayers, private non-profit program and service providers and various community groups, such as our Active Citizens for Education, have been asking questions and requesting specific information from school district officials about the decision-making, budgeting/accounting, administration and accountability of Fund 80 for several months. Responses from the district have been sporadic, piecemeal and confusing at best. Reviews of the information and budget reveal “accounting ploys” and a consistent lack of transparency as to line item expenses attributable to specific programs and services. The Board of Education has established no policies regarding program operations and evaluation. The board has routinely given ‘carte blanche’ approval to the administration’s budget proposals and tax levy requirements. The board has not established criteria for determinations as to whether a program or service should be included in the regular budget or in Fund 80. The budget for Fund 80 has increased 216% in five years from $3.8 million to $8.2 million. The percent of the Fund 80 budget supported by the separate tax levy outside the state mandated revenue cap has grown from 61% in 2001-02 to 93 percent in 2004-05. Please refer to the ACE ‘White Paper’ and charts entitled “Community Service Fund (Fund 80)”

Active Citizens for Education, therefore, calls upon the Madison Metropolitan School District Board of Education (BOE) to initiate an outside, independent audit of the Community Service Fund (80). This audit should be conducted with no ‘strings’ attached and a report, with recommendations, made to the Board of Education and the community not later than January 3, 2005. The audit should include, but not limited to:

• Does the BOE make a policy decision that program operations should be subsidized by a separate community tax levy?
• What criteria has the board established to determine a program or service should be included in Fund 80?
• What programs and services have been transferred to Fund 80 and by what authority?
• To what is attributed the growth in Fund 80 over the past five years?
• What is the impact of the separate tax levy for Fund 80 on property taxes in district?
• What programs and services have been evaluated, by what means and reported to whom?
• Are individual programs outside the usual instructional time frame?
• Is each program open to everyone in the community and what is the differentiated enrollment data for these programs and services over the past five years?
• What is the cost analysis for providing each program and service?
• To what extent (dollars and percentage) do fees cover the costs of individual programs and services?
• Do the accounting procedures and mechanisms provide for a transparency and an understanding of program goals, costs and benefits?

The Board of Education and the community deserves and has the right to know the important information and recommendations provided by such an audit. The audit information will help everyone conduct more informed discussions and make more enlightened decisions about the stewardship and accountability of priority programs and services in affordable and effective results-oriented approaches.

The goals of this audit request are to

• Obtain facts that are reliable

• Build trust among the Board, administration parents and the community

• Engage the Board and community interactively in communications and decision-making processes

• Identify accountabilities for personnel, policies, processes, procedures and decisions

Active Citizens for Education is pleased to announce a radio campaign which will begin inform the public about Fund 80, raise awareness of the impact of recent district actions regarding after school care programs and urging the community to contact board members about their concerns.

Thank you.

Notes:

1. Information was obtained from the web sites of the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) and the Madison Metropolitan School District (MMSD). The address for the DPI web site for the Community Services Fund is www.dpi.state.wi.us/dpi/dfm/sfms then click on “Community Service Fund” on the left-hand side bar.

The address for the MMSD web site is www.madison.k12.wi.us

2. Active Citizens for Education (ACE) is a Madison based non-profit, non-partisan organization committed to identifying, analyzing and presenting reliable information about issues concerning curriculum, instruction, administration and operation of the Madison Metropolitan School District. It is expected this information will assist in stimulating widespread public debate and increasing enlightened decision-making by the public and policy-makers to enhance the effectiveness, efficiency and performance of the Board of Education, administration, staff and pupils of the District.

Contact: ACE, Don Severson, President at P.O. 5303, Madison, WI 53705-0303

Phone: 608/238-8300;

Email: info@activecitizensforeducation.org

Web Site: www.activecitizensforeducation.org