The MVLA district has approved over $140 million towards the funding of both MVHS and LAHS for the 2024-25 school year, but where does the money actually go?
Taking the bulk of MVLA’s budget, employee salaries make up 83%, or $117 million of the district’s expenditures. This includes the salaries of teachers and other staff members, along with employee benefits.
“The [rest of the] balance is then on other services and operations and books and supplies for the school district,” Director of the Board of Trustees Sanjay Dave said.
According to the MVLA 2024-25 budget plan, the remaining $20 million is set apart for services, capital outlay, operating expenditures, and other miscellaneous costs.
“There’s sewer costs, there’s water, there’s all those [costs] just to literally turn the lights on,” said Mike Mathesian,the Associate Superintendent of Business Services. “There’s maintenance costs to keep the campuses looking nice.”
MVLA also receives certain amounts of money from the government that has a predetermined location to be set aside to.
“We get some money from the federal government, and that’s usually for certain programs, primarily special education,” said Elvis Lopez, Director of Fiscal Services.
At MVHS, Principal Dr. Kip Glazer manages the site allocation, which is given to her by the district. Site allocation, which Glazer considers to be an ‘instructional budget,’ is based on two main factors: department needs and the source of the funding.
“I want to respond to the department and their requesting needs so that they can do their job of serving students,” Glazer said.
These expenses cover the costs of a variety of educational materials, all the way from calculators for math classes to safety equipment for science classes.
“Science has about 20 percent of what I deem to be instructional budget,” Glazer said. “Visual Performing Arts has about another 25 percent.”
Finally, the library and the athletics department both get about 10% of the budget, with the rest being distributed across other departments based on need.
“That’s not to say that is a fixed budget for the year,” Glazer said. “[Departments] have additional requests that they’re making throughout the year, and I look at it to make sure that they’re being resourced.”
On the other hand, the source of the funding has a say in where the money they contribute goes as well.
“When athletic boosters give me money, they’ll say, ‘we want this to go to athletics,’” Glazer said.
Glazer and her administrative assistant, Joanna Plymale, also control other miscellaneous expenditures, Glazer said.
“We get reconciliation reports every month to make sure that we are actually spending the money that we should be spending,” Glazer said. “I just want the parents and students and staff to know that administration is committed to making sure that every dollar is spent wisely.”
