HANCOCK COUNTY — It’s the time of year when county school officials present estimated financial figures for the 2025 school year for advertisement before school boards and the public. Boards of Education will then approve the numbers and send the requests to the state for approval after all procedural steps are taken.
School districts across the state operate from three main funds within the total budget — the education, operations and debt services funds. Some districts however include other funds in their budgets depending on monies allotted for funds like the rainy day fund, school pension debt funds or a referendum.
While school boards are in the process of presenting their upcoming budgets to the community for the 2025 school year, the budgets won’t be officially adopted by the boards for a few weeks before the numbers are sent to the state, so district officials warn that numbers are simply projections and are subject to change.
The Mt. Vernon school district operates under the largest budget in the county, with projections for the 2025 school year having a grand total budget of $81.46 million. They’ve set aside $4.46 million in the referendum fund, $1.8 million in the rainy day fund, $20.86 million for the debt service fund, $237,811 for the school pension debt fund, $41 million for the education fund and $13.1 million for the operations fund.
District officials note that the estimated overall tax rate for 2025 is close to $0.19 lower than 2024, which was $0.15 lower than 2023. The Mt. Vernon Operating Referendum is now capped at 3% growth with a student enrollment factor that was recently enacted by new legislation. Due to this new legislation, their $0.17 original referendum rate is now estimated to be $0.1384 for 2025.
Greenfield-Central superintendent Harold Olin said there is nothing too unusual or different about their budget projections for the 2025 school year. A look at the total budget shows future total numbers at $65,56 million for the total budget. The district is allotting $750,000 for the rainy day fund, $17, 044,750 to the debt service fund, $33,674,500 to the education fund and $14,100,000 for the operations fund.
Officials with New Palestine Community Schools say their full operating budget for the 2025 school year is estimated at $55.54 million. Their rainy day fund will take $675,000, the debt service fund is estimated at $11.27 million, the operations fund is at $11.79 million and the education fund is estimated at $31.8 million. They also have a capital projects fund estimated at $3.17 million.
The financial supervisor for Eastern Hancock schools Adam Kinder said their budget has increase to an estimated $19 million for the 2025 school year. They’ve allotted $600,000 for the rainy day fund, $1.53 million for the debt service fund, $10.25 for the education fund and another $6.258 million for the operations fund.
“Budgets are a complicated process,” Kinder said. “We want to remind people, the budget that we advertise or publish, these are not necessarily the final numbers because we’re asking the state for what we want to spend, but we get what we get.”
District officials note that budget hearing numbers are traditionally inflated to guarantee the school receives the funds it is entitled to. The Department of Local Government Finance will apply the current statutes to adjust the requested values to appropriate levels.
