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Preliminary 2025‑26 budget presented as state aid, special education reimbursements remain uncertain
Summary
Assistant Superintendent Lenny Hansen said the district prepared a conservative preliminary budget for fiscal 2025–26 and is assuming a 33% special education reimbursement rate while awaiting state budget and final DPI aid figures expected in October.
Lenny Hansen, assistant superintendent, presented the West Bend Joint School District No. 1 preliminary budget for fiscal year 2025–26 and explained why the district could not adopt a final, firm budget before the state completes its biennial budget and releases final aid numbers.
Nut graf: Because Wisconsin school districts rely on state determinations for revenue limits and aid, Hansen said the preliminary budget uses conservative revenue assumptions — including a working assumption of roughly 33 percent special‑education reimbursement — and will be updated when DPI issues final figures later this year.
Hansen outlined the state timing that drives the budget: the state determines revenue limits and aid, often releases updated aid figures through the summer, and typically provides final numbers in October. "Those determinations then do not come until later in the year after our spending year, our fiscal year has already begun," he said.
Hansen said the district expects membership (the three‑year average the state uses to set revenue limits) to continue a gradual decline and noted special education reimbursement shortfalls: "That equates to more than a quarter of a million dollars this year in the current fiscal year that the district had expected to receive that it won't receive." He said the district is planning conservatively and maintaining contingency reserves to manage uncertainty.
Key assumptions in the preliminary budget include conservative revenue projections, continuing current special education reimbursement (assumed 33%), market‑trend health insurance increases, accounting for staff attrition and continuing to evaluate capital improvement fund allocations under DPI rules.
Hansen said the district will return an updated budget package at the next meeting; the district will adopt its official budget after receiving final DPI aid numbers and after the annual meeting of electors in September.
Ending: Hansen invited board questions and said administration will provide updated figures as the state process unfolds and will publish the district’s adopted budget after DPI releases final aid numbers in October.
