VIENNA — After two years of not paying, the free lunches are almost over for students of the Maries R-1 School District.

At the April R-1 School Board meeting, Superintendent Teresa Messersmith gave the board a budget overview, which included information about the school’s food service program.

Maries R-1 will continue to offer free lunches during this year’s summer school program, which is from May 23 through June 22. Lunches will be served in the school cafeteria from 11 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. Lunch will be free for any students attending summer school and also for any students in the R-1 district ages pre-K to 18 years of age. They must come to the school cafeteria to eat the meal. 

Messersmith informed the school board that students will begin paying for their lunches and filling out free and reduced lunch forms again for the 2022-2023 school year, which begins in August. This is after two years of not paying for lunches during the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic when the federal government covered the cost of lunches for all students. She said this will be a transition for parents. 

The school district will lose the current reimbursement rates that were much higher than the normal reimbursement rates. The current reimbursement rates are $2.61 for breakfast and $4.56 for lunch. Previous reimbursement rates were $0.35 per regular meal, $3.26 per reduced price meal, and $3.66 for free meal. 

Messersmith said DESE has not yet released the new reimbursement rates or new lunch prices. She suspects DESE may increase the reimbursement rate, but is not sure. She said the district will have to raise lunch/breakfast prices for students and staff. Maries R-1 sells 350 meals per day at lunch. The school will have to increase the staff meal rates but probably won’t know what this will be until possibly June. 

Previous prices for lunches were $2.20 grades K-5, $2.30 for grades 6-8, and $2.40 for grades 9-12. Messersmith said they know food costs are going to increase due to inflation. She said Maries R-1 typically runs $30,000 to $40,000 in the red on the lunch program. With cost increases and the reimbursement rates down, the deficit may be more than that. 

For the 2021-2022 budget, revenues were estimated at $220,000 and year-to-date revenues have been $217,994. There are three months of wages to go and the school will continue to receive revenues for the current school year through June. Budgeted expenditures were estimated at $222,281.29 and actual expenditures thus far are $185,292.33. Current year-to-date revenues over expenditures is a positive $8,988.96.

Unexpected purchases this year included a new cooler for $4,704, garbage disposal for $1,950, and two lunch tables for $3,411, for a total of $10,065. 

Also in her budget report to the school board, the superintendent reported on propane expenditures. Budgeted expenditures were estimated at $32,500 and year-to-date expenditures are $39,454. She said the school district will need to purchase about $13,500 in propane to finish the year. Estimated expenditures for the 2021-2022 school year for propane are $53,000, which is $20,500 over budgeted expenditures. 

For the 2022-2023 school year, estimated expenditures for propane are $63,000 using estimated cost of $1.60 per gallon. This is $30,500 over the current school year’s budget expenditures. 

The school’s propane contract runs out at the end of June and the plan is to get all the propane the school can at the current price, but the school can only fill the propane tanks to a certain percentage. Messersmith said she expects the price will go up and has estimated it going up from the current $1.36 per gallon to $1.60 per gallon. 

Expenditures for electricity are expected to be higher as well. For the current school year, budget expenses were estimated at $50,000. Year-to-date expenses are $49,891 with there still being expenditures for May and June of about $10,000. The estimated expenditures for the school year are $60,000, which is $10,000 over budget. 

Estimated expenditures for the 2022-2023 school year are $65,000, which includes an eight percent increase by Ameren Missouri that began in Feb. 2022. Messersmith predicts expenditures to be $15,000 over the current budget expenditures.

Transportation expenses are predicted to be over budget, too. For bus drivers’ salaries, the expenditures were budgeted at $260,000 and year-to-date expenditures are $221,094. Expenditures for April and May will be about $49,000. For the current school year, estimated expenditures are $270,000, which is $10,000 over budget. Messersmith said the school board anticipated this when they gave the bus drivers a raise, which was effective Sept. 2021. 

For bus fuel, estimated expenditures for the 2022-2023 school year are $10,000 and year-to-date expenses are $13,826 with more expenditures added during April and May. Estimated expenses for the current school year are $16,000, which is $6,000 over budgeted expenses. 

For the 2022-2023 school year, Messersmith said estimated expenses for bus fuel are $20,000 based on current fuel prices of $4.07, which is $10,000 over the current school year’s budgeted expenses. 

Adding all of the over budgeted expenses together totals $46,500. Estimated budget expenses for these accounts will be an additional $26,000 over 2021-2022 expenses, which is an additional cost of $72,500. 

Messersmith told the board members there are areas in the budget where they didn’t spend as much and this will help somewhat. She thinks they will be okay as they used government COVID-19 money to pay salaries, which freed up money to use elsewhere. Also, the school district had an assessed valuation increase of $100,000.