Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
LARWILL - Whitko Community School Board held a public hearing for the 2026-27 budget and a second bond hearing on Monday, Sept. 21.
“Whitko currently has 143 active funds … we are required to approve and adopt any funds that receive state basic grant dollars or tax dollars,” said Whitko Business Manager Lynn Leininger.
The four funds that are a part of the budget hearing are the education, operations, debt service and rainy day funds. Altogether, the proposed budget, which will be approved at the October meeting, totaled $22,150,250.
The two funds that are affected by Senate Bill 1 (SB1) are the operation and debt service funds as they are primarily funded by property taxes. Since the approval of SB1, this has affected how much can be given through tax levies and gives a property tax cap.
Leininger showed the board the bus replacement plan and the capital projects plan. The bus replacement plan coincides with the proposed bond that was also discussed at the August meeting.
“On the purchase of equipment for the Whitko Career Academy … do we know what those things are, exactly?” Board Secretary Lynn Studebaker asked. “Because I thought we were supposed to be getting money for each student that attended, and that money would pay for things like this so it wouldn’t be on our taxpayers … a lot of these are students from other school districts.”
“The capital projects plan is just for advertising,” said Leininger. “We put that in there, but it doesn’t mean we're going to necessarily pay for it … we have to show that we have appropriations in place.”
“So, you’re calling it something that it’s not?” asked Studebaker.
“We have to advertise potential expenses,” responded Leininger.
“When other students come from other schools, do we get a portion of their Perkins money?” asked Board President Scott Werstler.
“We do … we get about $575,000 for all the courses taken out here,” responded Leininger.
The public hearing was adjourned, and the board held a second determination hearing on the proposed bond for new buses, which is required by law. Leininger, along with Whitko’s Municipal Advisor Mike Therber of Therber and Brock, spoke again about why this is needed, and what will be accomplished with the bond.
The total proposed cost for the bus replacement will not exceed $3 million, with interest cost totaling $341,800.
The reason for the bond hearing is because the total amount of the project will cost more than $1 million.
“If this is approved next month, we should be able to sell the bonds mid-November, and close about a month after that,” said Therber.
Studebaker asked if “this is normal for school districts to use bonds to buy buses,” which Therber answered that with the constraints put on schools, “it’s becoming more and more common” as it’s tough to fund all the items in the operations budget.
Brandon Monticue, a resident of South Whitley, remarked on the budget, stating there was an inconsistency because one of the buses was no longer in the fleet. He said “instead of buying new buses,” the school corporation should look at doing more maintenance for the bus shop.
“If Whitko Junior-Senior High School looked like this, we would probably be the laughingstock when visiting teams showed up,” said Monticue. “For a school corporation that has approximately 1,040 students … It seems to like a lot of directors. Maybe there’s some jobs that could be combined … so we can spend less on and use those funds for the buses and maintenance that needs to happen.”
Werstler remarked this is the first step to the legal process, and “to help conserve tax dollars while meeting our educational needs.”
The project resolution is required when a school corporation is planning to spend more than $1 million on a given facility or type of work or procurement. It contains the estimated hard and soft construction cost and the costs of issuance and establishes the total project cost. It also contains the estimated tax impact. This failed to get a second motion.
While the board will hear the budget hearing during the Oct. 19 meeting, it is unknown at this time whether the bond hearing will also be heard at that time.
