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CSFO: Early property-tax collections and modest sales-tax growth keep district revenue healthy
Summary
Chief School Financial Officer Jay Duke told the board that early property-tax collections and slight sales-tax increases have kept fiscal-year revenue on track two months into the year; staff highlighted per-pupil funding trends when adjusted for inflation.
Chief School Financial Officer Jay Duke presented financial reports for the months ending Oct. 31 and Nov. 30 and told the Tuscaloosa City Schools Board that revenue and expenditures are tracking close to budget early in the fiscal year.
"At this point, we are 2 months in our fiscal year, which began Oct. 1 and again ending Nov. 30. So we're 16% into our budget year," Duke said. He said property-tax collections are coming in "healthy early compared to the last few years," and that the district's budget for property tax this year is $33,500,000.
Duke reported modest movement in other revenue streams: automobile tag revenue showed a slight decline year-over-year for November, and sales tax was up about 1.5% over the first two months compared with the same period last year, roughly a $61,000 increase. Overall general-fund expenditures were about 15.6% of budget while revenue collections were about 16.7% of budget at the two-month mark.
Duke also reviewed longer-term context, showing state foundation per-pupil funding in raw dollars has risen since 2007 but falls when adjusted for inflation. "Now factor in inflation ... that line ... is going in the opposite direction when you factor in inflation," he told the board, noting the 2025 Alabama legislative session had just started and that the district would monitor any changes to the funding formula.
Duke closed with a snapshot of the Child Nutrition Program (CNP), a special-revenue fund: revenues for October and November were about $1.85 million with expenditures near $1.8 million, both near budgeted levels. He noted the district's comprehensive F2A state report shows a larger aggregated number of roughly $75 million across funds, explaining much of that total is earmarked across different funds and that one-time technology advances are part of the current-year increase.
Board members asked whether timing of property-tax receipts explained year-to-date variances; Duke agreed timing (for example, a large taxpayer paying earlier) could explain the early uptick and said collections should level out across the year.
