Budget advisory committee recommends fund‑balance allocations, urges capital request to town

The North Kingstown Budget and Finance Advisory Committee on Feb. 2 recommended a package of fund‑balance allocations and capital priorities to the School Committee and asked the district to seek town capital funding for larger facility and equipment needs.

Leslie Ann Powell, the district’s director of finance, told the committee staff could not produce a full fiscal‑2026 budget‑to‑actual with projections in time for the meeting because the district’s Munis financial system experienced an outage and required a full restore. "We were midstream on our projections through January when this happened," Powell said, and she said payroll restorations were prioritized. Powell said she will complete the report and circulate it to the advisory committee or provide a memo and answer questions before the next meeting.

The committee’s recommendations — which it voted to forward to the School Committee — include: adding $75,000 to the anticipated turf/track replacement (bringing the district contribution to $150,000), creating a CTE (non‑technology) capital line seeded at $100,000 with a proposed $75,000 annual follow‑up, seeding a curriculum reserve at $100,000 with $100,000 annually thereafter, increasing fleet upgrade funding to $150,000, establishing an athletics capital seed of $100,000 with $25,000 per year ongoing, reseeding playgrounds at $100,000 with $35,000 annually, and maintaining or adding library/media reserves (proposed $25,000 per year). Committee members stressed that these allocations are recommendations and that final assignment of fund balance requires School Committee approval.

Members discussed vendor delays and estimates for turf and track work, and questioned high line‑item estimates such as a $243,000 entry for tennis‑court resurfacing; a committee member noted an earlier competitive bid eight years ago had been $44,000. Powell and the superintendent said they would verify sources and vendor qualifications before the School Committee meeting.

The advisory committee also debated whether to ask the town for a specific list of projects or for an annual lump‑sum capital appropriation the district could allocate to long‑term needs. The committee voted to recommend that the School Committee forward a capital request to the town in an amount to be recommended by the superintendent, to be prioritized against identified needs such as boilers, fleet replacements, and turf/track depreciation.

The committee agreed to provide its recommendations to the School Committee for consideration at upcoming meetings and to circulate updated budget‑to‑actual information once the finance office completes work following the Munis outage. The advisory committee made the motion, received a second and approved the motion by voice vote; the School Committee will receive the recommendations and decide whether to adopt them or modify allocations before forwarding a final budget to the town.