Flieg Talks About 2016 TIF Fund Settlement’s Impact On R-II School District Budget

Dr. Julie Flieg, superintendent of schools, and Dr. Paul Taylor, assistant superintendent, addressed the amount of money the district received from the Valle Springs Tax Increment Financing (TIF) settlement and the district’s graduation rate at the Ste. Genevieve R-II School District Board of Education meeting on March 19.

“I know several of the board members have been asked questions recently about the Valle Springs TIF settlement money,” Flieg said. “I’ve been asked a few questions. To be honest, I didn’t know because I wasn’t superintendent when this happened, so I wasn’t part of the discussions and the decison-making.”

She said that after some “digging,” she had the correct figures to share.

“The total settlement of the Valle Springs TIF was $600,000,” she said. “There were approximately $17,000 for the attorneys’ fees, so the entire settlement was for $583,000 and a  little bit extra.”

The real estate entities got $370,310. The sales taxing total was $212,764.

“I know the rumor out there is that Ste. Gen. R-II got $400,000 of this money,” Flieg said, “and that’s not true. Because, when you add the district on here, the only portion the district was able to get any money from was the real estate side. That is where we get our money.”

The school district’s actual total from the settlement was $279,534.

“We didn’t get any of the sales tax money,” Flieg said. “That went to other entities.”

Flieg also explained what the district had done with that money.

“In June 2016, when the budget was presented, we were projected to deficit spend by $603,000.”

Flieg showed slides with the figures. Fund 1, the General Fund, received $91,172. Fund 2, the Special Revenue [or Teachers’] Fund, received $58,408. Fund 4, the Capital Improvement Fund, received $129,953.

“The placement of the money in Fund 1 and Fund 2 was to help cover that deficit spending in both of those funds,” Flieg said, “and that deficit spending is for salary and benefits of all the certified and non-certified staff. So the money that was put in those two funds covered the deficit spending and helped the salary meet salary and benefit expenses.”

The money in Fund 4, Flieg said, helped complete projects like work on Yanks Field and Leon’s Field after bond issues for those projects had fallen a little short.

“It was just to put those final touches to make it a facility that we needed and the community needed also,” she said.

See complete story in the March 27 edition of the Herald.