Plymouth Community School Board members heard from Corporation Business Manager Steven Boyer on final numbers for the coming 2025 budget that will be sent on to the Indiana Department of Local Government Finance (DLGF) for final approval.
The corporation will advertise a debt service of $5,895,950 with a tax levy of $5,321,851 and a tax rate of .5596.
Boyer told the board that due to the corporation being able to retire some debt, the tax rate would be slightly lower (.11) than last year.
The school will advertise a budget for the Education fund at $27 million with that funding provided by the state of Indiana based on school enrollment.
Boyer told the board that the official day for student enrollment count was Oct. 1 — the day of the meeting — and that Plymouth schools will see a slight decrease in the school population leading to a slight decrease in the amount of funds that the state will send to the school.
The Education fund is money provided for teacher and administrator salaries and instructional materials. The state of Indiana passed a bill in 2023 to make all textbooks free to students and the money for that comes from the education fund.
Boyer told the board that there is a current cash balance in the fund of $6.4 million that will be carried over.
The total for the 2025 budget comes to $42,645,950 with a levy of $11,129,393 and a tax rate of 1.1703.
Boyer also presented the Capital Projects Plan for the corporation for the coming year, which was mostly maintenance items at the various campuses in the corporation.
Big ticket items were:
Public address system replacement at Plymouth High School for $275,000.
Upgrading the HVAC system at PHS at $195,000.
Unit ventilator Replacement at Jefferson Elementary at $135,000.
Carpet replacement at PHS at $120,000.
HVAC upgrade at Riverside at $110,000.
Replacement of maintenance and grounds equipment at $120,000.
Also adopted was the bus replacement plan for the corporation. The corporation plans to replace two 66-passenger buses in 2025 at $175,000 each.
The numbers will be sent to the DLGF for approval and final budget numbers will be sent back to the school after that process.
