The Nordonia Hills City School District Board of Education on July 28 approved a five-year contract for Treasurer Kyle Kiffer and a separate addendum clarifying terms of his prior contract, then heard a fiscal-year-end financial report showing the district finished the year with a $710,000 deficit. Board members voted unanimously to approve the contracts and the consent items tied to the treasurer's recommendations.

The treasurer’s report matters because it summarized the district’s recent revenue and expenditure trends and how they compare with forecasts, information board members said they used in recent budget decisions. "We were projecting a negative $4,900,000 for fiscal 2025 in May 2024; the district finished the year with a negative $710,000," Treasurer Kyle Kiffer said during the meeting. "That movement reflects reductions in salaries and benefits and other savings we implemented."

Kiffer told the board the deficit was largely in line with the district’s more recent forecasts and that revenue collections and expenditures had shifted compared with the prior year. He said collections were roughly 1.9% higher than the prior comparable period, driven in part by local reimbursements tied to personal property and utilities, while overall expenditures rose about 2.4% year over year driven by purchase services and contractual obligations. Kiffer said the board’s recent levy work and staffing adjustments helped narrow a previously larger projected shortfall.

In addition to approving Kiffer’s five-year contract and the contract addendum (which the board described as clarifying salary terms from the third-year reopener in his earlier contract), the board approved several routine and operational items on the consent agenda. Those approvals included authorization for the district’s routing schedule with a designee authorized to modify routes during the school year, a five-year lease for a Pitney Bowes folding/mailing machine used for large mailings, a student-teaching agreement with the University of Akron, special-education service agreements for students placed outside the district, an hourly agreement for visually impaired student services with ESE of Northeast Ohio, and an agreement allowing Heights Driving School to use district buildings for driver instruction.

Board members also approved routine personnel items — certified and classified hires, resignations and supplemental contracts — and votes to transfer remaining funds from a 2023 class account to the Class of 2026 account and to set petty cash/change funds for the 2025–26 year. The meeting record does not state an exact dollar amount for the class-account transfer; Kiffer described the item as a closing transfer of whatever remains in the Class of 2023 account to the Class of 2026 account.

During the transportation discussion, the treasurer and superintendent reported the district has 36 bus drivers on staff and 32 active bus routes; the board approved the routing schedule and authorized a designee to make later adjustments if needed. The treasurer thanked district finance staff for year-end work and noted the district had three consecutive fiscal years with relatively small deficits or surpluses compared with the roughly $60 million annual budget, a result he attributed to board actions, staff adjustments and contract management.

No board member voiced opposition to the contracts or the financial reports during the meeting. The board set next regular meeting for Aug. 25 at 7 p.m. at Northfield Elementary School.

"There’s a reason why I do this," Kiffer said, describing his work. "We try to indirectly educate kids by supporting the board, community and staff through the dollars and cents."