Twenty-six school districts have been designated as fiscally stressed under New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli’s Fiscal Stress Monitoring System. Although the same number of districts were designated in fiscal stress last year, many of the entities in this year’s list have changed. Only 12 were designated as stressed in both 2018 and 2017.
“Despite the ongoing financial pressures facing school districts, our fiscal stress monitoring system has revealed encouraging results in several communities,” said DiNapoli. “However, school boards and superintendents must remain cautious. Today’s budget decisions can have long-lasting implications and can quickly move a district into fiscal stress.”
Using financial indicators that include year-end fund balance, cash position, short-term borrowing and patterns of operating deficits, DiNapoli’s monitoring system creates an overall fiscal stress score which drives the classification.
This year, five school districts are designated in “significant fiscal stress” and the remaining 21 as “susceptible to fiscal stress.” The scores are based on the evaluation of 672 school districts with fiscal years ending on June 30, 2018.
The five school districts that were classified in “significant stress” are Eldred (Sullivan County); New Suffolk (Suffolk); Norwich (Chenango); Schenevus (Otsego) and Wyandanch (Suffolk).
A report released by DiNapoli today in conjunction with the fiscal stress scores showed the regions of Central New York, Long Island and the Southern Tier as those having comparatively high percentages of districts in fiscal stress.
The scores are based on financial information submitted as part of each district’s ST-3 financial report filed with the State Education Department as of Dec. 28, 2018. Today’s announcement does not include scores for the dependent school districts in the “Big Four” cities of Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse and Yonkers. Information for these districts will be incorporated into the scoring for their respective cities later this year. The monitoring system does not score New York City.
For a list of school districts designated in fiscal stress, visit:https://www.osc.state.ny.us/localgov/fiscalmonitoring/schools/pdf/2018/stress-list.pdf
For the complete list of school district fiscal stress scores, visit:https://www.osc.state.ny.us/localgov/fiscalmonitoring/index.htm
For a copy of the fiscal stress report, visit:https://www.osc.state.ny.us/localgov/fiscalmonitoring/pdf/common-themes-for-school-year-2017-18.pdf
