Sun Prairie district report: $10 million in general-fund 'nonfixed' spending identified as discretionary

Phil Frey, director of business and finance for the Sun Prairie Area School District, presented a report to the school board on Jan. 13 that identified about $10 million — roughly 7% of the district’s general fund — as “nonfixed” or discretionary spending.

Frey said the district’s budget is heavily concentrated in personnel and fixed costs. “66% of our budget is for salary and benefits not included in fixed cost,” he said, and “93% of our budget is connected to salary benefits or fixed costs,” leaving an estimated 7% for supplies, equipment and other discretionary uses.

The nonfixed total is the sum of roughly $1.7 million allocated to school-level budgets and about $7.7 million in district support budgets, Frey said. He cautioned that the classification is not produced by a state-required accounting report: "this is not a report that's a canned report that you can get from the state of Wisconsin," and the district’s numbers are “manually determined,” he warned. “These numbers ... take a lot of calculation and manual entry.”

Nut graf: The report aimed to isolate portions of the general fund over which district leaders have discretion to reallocate resources. That distinction matters because most of the district’s spending is tied to personnel, benefits or contractual obligations; the nonfixed portion funds items such as classroom supplies, software subscriptions, equipment replacement and discretionary school activities.

Frey described how school building budgets are determined. Schools receive a per-pupil allocation multiplied by the district’s third-Friday enrollment count. Schools with higher rates of economically disadvantaged students receive higher per-pupil allocations for equity; Frey used West Side Elementary as an example of a higher-allocation school. Secondary schools receive larger per-pupil allocations than elementary schools “because secondary schools across the country spend more,” he said.

Examples Frey gave of nonfixed expenditures include classroom supplies, furniture and equipment, copier maintenance and postage. He listed technology and software licenses — including Skyward and Frontline — as recurring nonfixed costs but noted that those licenses are necessary: “we need to have a license for that,” he said of financial software. The district also budgets for music-equipment replacement, online curriculum subscriptions, dual-enrollment payments, training registration fees and registration for conferences.

In district support budgets, Frey highlighted administrative costs such as publication notices mandated by state statute for school board meetings. He said the state-provided Common School Fund is restricted to library-related purchases such as books and online subscriptions and is allocated to schools after state finalization, typically in January or February.

Frey also identified other recurring items in support budgets: the employee wellness clinic (about $600,000 annually), daycare funding under operations, school-safety subscriptions (ALICE, Raptor), and software or mapping services in school operations. Technology budgets chiefly cover device replacement, repairs and supplies.

No formal board action or vote was recorded in the transcript. Frey closed by reiterating the limits of the analysis — that the nonfixed classification required manual calculation and should be interpreted cautiously — and invited board members and the public to direct questions to him or to attend the meeting.

Ending: The presentation provided a high-level view of discretionary spending within the district’s general fund and clarified how school allocations and several recurring district expenses are funded. Frey said a more detailed line-item review would require additional hours of staff work and is available on request.