Operations committee projects $384,000 surplus, weighs moving Munis financial system to cloud

Wallingford School District operations committee members reviewed a financial projection through April that shows a $384,000 surplus and discussed a planned migration of the district—s Munis financial system to a cloud-hosted service.

The surplus figure represents a decrease of about $342,000 from earlier projections, Finance staff member Mr. Barone said. He told the committee that salary costs rose, largely because of certified substitute projections, offset somewhat by about $27,000 in certified salary savings from unpaid leaves of absence. Barone said other drivers include a $210,000 increase in special education behavioral therapist services, an estimated $200,000 one-time cost to move Munis to the cloud, and about $11,000 estimated lunch debt that had been covered in part last year through a temporary waiver.

Barone said the district currently shows roughly $26 million in available balance in the Munis standard municipal report and that, if nothing else changes, the April projection would leave a $384,000 surplus at year end. He noted about $10 million in outstanding purchase orders (encumbrances) that are not reflected in the town—s posted figures.

On the Munis migration, Barone said moving to a cloud deployment managed by Tyler, the vendor that owns the Munis software, would mean vendor-managed data security, automatic updates and patches, improved application support, and reduced local hardware needs. He said the district could lock in a three-year price if it moves now but that the cloud subscription would be more expensive overall, with the principal benefit being service and security rather than immediate operating-cost savings.

Committee members asked clarifying questions. Committee member Mrs. Veilloux said the main cash savings would come when on-premises servers need replacement. Committee member Mr. Ross asked about operational control of crossing guards (a separate line item discussed during the review); Barone explained the police department manages crossing guards while the district pays them.

By unanimous voice consensus, committee members approved forwarding the financial reports (document 4.1 and the projection packet) to the full board for action at the next meeting.

The committee also accepted the minutes from the March 10 meeting by roll call earlier in the meeting.

Looking ahead, Barone said the capital improvement "waterfall" plan was updated to reflect bonding approved by the town council for three boiler replacement projects at district schools; bids adjusted final amounts and those projects were marked as proceeding pending the council—s timeline.

With no further questions, the committee moved to the next agenda items.