The Brandon Valley School District 49-2 board voted to approve the presented bills and claims and accepted the October financial report at its Nov. 13 meeting.

District business manager Mr. Lundberg reviewed invoices and highlighted several items: $17,500 in activity-worker charges within an annual activity budget he said totals about $200,000; large construction payments to contractors (contractor names and totals were discussed by Lundberg); and concern about a substantial rate increase announced by Sioux Valley Energy that Lundberg said will materially affect the district’s electrical budget. Lundberg said the district spends roughly $1.2 million a year on electricity and estimated that next year’s rate increase could add roughly $100,000 to that cost.

Lundberg also noted the food-service department was operating at a fully accrued loss of about $96,000 in October, compared with about $63,000 at the same point last year. The board’s food-service contractor, Performance Food Service, was listed on the bills at about $190,009.28 for the period cited.

Lundberg presented the cash and investment report for October: an investment report number of $21,841,418 was cited and payroll for October was reported at just over $3,010,000. Fund balances and percent-of-year expenditures across general, capital outlay, special education and bond redemption funds were presented; Lundberg said most measures were close to last year’s pacing. The board moved and approved both the bills and the financial report on voice votes.

Several figures in Lundberg’s oral report were phrased rapidly and some amounts in the transcript appear garbled; where transcript language was unclear (specific payment-number line items and some large totals) this article reports the verified and clearly stated items and flags other amounts as not specified.