School district gets $25 million from state.

BROOKSVILLE — A $25 million windfall is coming to the Hernando County School District by state financiers to pay for school maintenance, repair, renovation and other capital expenses.
School officials have been hoping to get the extra funding for months. However, it wasn’t until late Wednesday evening that chief financial officer Deborah Bruggink got the news.
“They’ve been tight on the capital money,” Bruggink said about such funding from the state in the past. “I think in essence the money we previously have been given has gone for more portables. Portables are the fastest way to get classrooms out there.”
All that can change now.
“I think this money will help (the district) move toward more permanent buildings,” Bruggink said. “It won’t buy a school (they cost from $15 to $44 million), but it can be used to supplement (building).”
Schools facilities director Roland Bavota said it’s too early to tell which schools will get the money for additional space. He and his staff will review that information during the summer.
Facilities employees must first identify projects to be able to spend the dollars.
“We’re looking at where it makes sense to add permanent classroom space throughout the district,” Bavota said.
The windfall comes in three categories.
An increase of $340,443 was given to school maintenance giving that category a total of $1,206,699.
New construction dollars were increased by $1,400,748 bringing that total to $4,756,122; and the capital designation known as Classrooms for Kids received $23,227,656 — an increase of $21,627,656.
The news of the $25 million capital infusion comes at a time when school officials have expressed concern over being ranked 66th in operational expenses given by the state. Operational expenses pay for school salaries, benefits and school programs.
The 66th-place designation means that the local district receives fewer per-student dollars than most school districts in Florida, at $6,439 per student. Only Suwannee County receives fewer dollars per student.
However, none of that funding affects the building process. Bruggink believes that the increase in building dollars was granted to Hernando County because the district is considered close behind Flagler County’s school district in growth.
Flagler, one of the state’s fastest-growing counties, received nearly $33 million. Hernando County received $29,190,477 — a massive increase in capital dollars considering last year’s paltry assessment of $3,855,817.
“They’ve traditionally never totally funded school construction,” Bruggink said. “(The funding) may be somewhat based on the ages of the buildings, ratios they are seeing with the numbers and higher growth.”
Thus far, Bruggink and her staff have projected a 1,600-student increase for the coming 2006-2007 school year. She said during a Tuesday workshop that that projection might be a bit too high.
The actual numbers, according to past trends, may fall closer to 1,200 additional students, which represents about 2 percent growth from last year. Either way, Bruggink was far more conservative in projecting assessments for capital funding.
“The last big amount we received was $6 million,” Bruggink said.
This year, however, the state doled out larger capital amounts causing more than $1.5 billion to be assessed for school districts throughout the state.
Bruggink said it’s possible that the state is finally distributing more money to pay for the Class Size Amendment because the measurement efforts for decreasing class size will change this year.
Last year, the school district was measured on how it was decreasing class size on the district level. In October, area schools will be judged on whether they are meeting the class size requirements on a school level. Eventually, by the beginning of the 2010-2011 school year, each school district will be judged and penalized if they do not meet class size mandates at the class level.
The class level restricts each class to: 18 students in prekindergarten through third grade; 22 students in fourth through eighth grades and 25 students in ninth through 12th grades.
During the last legislative session, lawmakers attempted to identify if the Class Size Amendment for schools should be sent back to the voters. Those attempts failed. Bruggink said after those attempts failed, it’s possible that state lawmakers recognized that the class size requirements were here to stay.
“That has really forced the legislators to put money into education,” Bruggink said.
Regardless of the politics that surround capital funding, Bruggink is hopeful about the future.
“I’m optimistic that this may be the trend,” she said.