Celina pledges to tackle finances

CELINA - School board members have initiated a restructuring process that will result in some staffing cuts and internal audits in an effort to curb expenses and ward off deficit spending.

Board members at this week's regular meeting moved to eliminate the curriculum director position held by Vaughn Ray effective Aug. 1.

The facilities director position held by Phil Metz will also be on the chopping block once the new grades 7-12 building project is completed in 2027, according to superintendent Brooke Gessler.

At the same time, Gessler called for the creation of a new business manager position, which she hopes to see filled by next summer.

"In our district, when I came in … I recognized a need to restructure," said Gessler, who came on board with a three-year contract on Aug. 1. "There are a lot of systems and processes that are not in place that benefit a district."

Looking at the overall financial picture, school officials said it's imperative that two crucial levies set to expire in the coming years are renewed in order for the district to remain financially solvent.

Treasurer Michelle Mawer's five-year forecast shows the district falling into deficit spending in fiscal year 2027, but there are many unknown factors at this point, chief among them future state funding levels.

Personnel wages and benefits make up about 80% of the budget, Mawer said.

"Before we go back to the community and ask for a renewal even, we have to be able to demonstrate that we are being good stewards of the finances," Gessler said. "We will continue to evaluate personnel and the needs … so as not to sacrifice meeting the needs of our kids and other places in the district."

Ray began as the district's curriculum director in August 2019. He's tasked with implementing district initiatives and facilitating high-quality instructional practices to challenge, prepare and empower students.

In July 2023, Ray revealed that new instructional materials introduced over the last few years had yielded positive results in the classroom. The combined efforts of students and teachers returned the district to proficiency levels not seen since before the COVID shutdown in the 2019-2020 school year, he said at the time.

Asked by the newspaper, Gessler said the elimination of the curriculum director position will save the district over $100,000 a year.

"Essentially that's a reduction in force, and so through that restructuring, those responsibilities, I'll absorb some with federal programs, and … we will lean into the service contract we have in place right now with Mercer County ESC to help meet our curriculum needs," Gessler told board members.

Metz in November 2021 was reassigned from intermediate principal/business manager to the newly created position of facilities director to guide the district through the $126.8 million building project. Then-superintendent Ken Schmiesing had said the responsibility warranted its own position.

Gessler stressed that decisions to cut positions are not reflective of the people inhabiting them.

"I think that's important," she told the newspaper. "These decisions are made with meeting the needs of what we have right now and into the foreseeable future and to, again, restructure some things and put some systems in place that we need to have to be efficient and effective."

Elaborating on the importance of internal audits in relation to finances, Gessler said the eventual business manager will work in close liaison with the transportation, maintenance and food services departments as well as the facilities director.

"That person is going to be tasked with really getting some mechanisms and some structures in place so that we can assess where our spending is going, what our existing contracts (are)," she said. "When's the last time we evaluated those existing contracts with vendors? What (does) our supply purchasing look like? Are we still getting the best prices? Are we overpurchasing? Are we wasting materials?"

Many school districts have such positions to monitor and evaluate the business component in a meaningful and ongoing way, Gessler noted. While working at Sidney City Schools, Gessler said personnel serving in that capacity found the district was overpurchasing certain supplies.

"Once we reevaluated that we were able to save money. That was over $100,000 worth for one vendor," she said. "If we can even save $10,000 to $20,000, for example, by evaluating one contract, imagine that times 10 contracts or any future contracts. … It has a cumulative effect and that's what we really need to start doing."