The property tax circuit breaker, passed by the Indiana General Assembly and signed into law by Gov. Mitch Daniels this year, limits the amount of property tax that can be collected by all taxing entities from the property.

The Superintendent of Clay Community Schools, Daniel Schroeder, explained what this is going to mean to the school corporation at the school board meeting held on April 10, 2008 (http://www.clay.k12.in.us/downloads/boardmeeting/min41008%20.pdf). What he stated was, "In 2010, circuit breakers will kick in if homes have taxes greater than 1 percent of their assessed value, which will require taxing units to reduce their expenses. Farm property and business rentals are capped at 2 percent and business and personal property is capped at 3 percent. In 2009, if the assess valuation holds true, the school corporation would lose $57,000 out of the budget. In 2010, $239,000 would be lost. The legislature has looked at credits to ease the school corporations that would be under the circuit breaker. The circuit breaker would not affect the school corporation budget in 2009, but in 2010, $109,740 would need to be cut from the budget. In the funds that don't have a levy, there would be no cuts. In this biennium, the legislature will take over the funding of the General Fund and the Special Ed/Preschool Fund. When the circuit breaker dollars are taken from the budget, it will affect Transportation, School Bus Replacement and Capital Projects. Because the Transportation budget is not as healthy at this time as it should be, cuts would be made in the School Bus Replacement Fund and the Capital Projects Fund. Debt Service must be paid first. Otherwise, the state will withhold funds from the General Fund."

The school corporation's Annual Financial Report is contained in the minutes of the Feb. 7, 2008, school board meeting at the following website (http://www.clay.k12.in.us/downloads/boardmeeting/min2708.pdf). The gist of the report is that we are expending 95 percent of our General Fund dollars on employee salaries and benefits while the state average is 85 percent and if costs continue to rise, especially insurance, within two years, a starting teacher will pay out their entire salary for insurance if they insure their family.

Currently, about 75 percent of the Capital Project Fund is being used to shore up the General Fund by paying utilities, insurance and other operating costs, leaving around $800,000 to maintain and repair buildings.

According to the article in the June 6, 2008, edition of The Brazil Times, the school corporation's Transportation Department has expended $60,000 over last year's budget for fuel. The probability of fuel costs declining is virtually non-existent.

That is the current and projected situation. The question is what are we going to do about it? The school corporation is operating on a tight budget already, but it cannot continue to do so indefinitely. Our schools are maintaining a level of service, to date, but the time is coming when that will no longer be possible.

The purpose of the Clay Community Schools Corporation is the education of the students. It is not to impress people with our buildings, provide any portion of the populace with any certain building, class above the requirements for a diploma, or extracurricular program that they desire, or to do anything other than educate students to the minimum requirements for the award of a high school diploma.

We simply need to get back to the original purpose, education, so that these students can step into college and the workforce with the tools they will need to succeed. We need to examine the school corporation's operation and control its costs. We need to examine its needs and not accept someone's opinion that there is a need. A need has a provable basis that is rational and logical while anyone can express an opinion that there is a need. "I need food to survive" is provable. In the absence of food, a person will die. "I need chocolate," on the other hand, is an unproven opinion of need, although I do say it on occasion.

In the next few years, we will be paying less property tax unless the law changes. The projection is that our schools will be getting less money for the education of our students. We need to start cutting costs in all areas that we can. We need to think about the future and make wise decisions that will allow us to maintain the education level within our schools even if we have to sacrifice the number of buildings that we currently have, extracurricular activities or extra classes above what our diplomas require.