School administrative costs not out of line

Here are estimated tax bills for the Feb. 9 election:

o Battle Ground: Estimated 2011 levy rate $2.99 per $1,000 assessed value for $200,000 home, tax would be $598.

o Evergreen: Estimated 2011 levy rate $3.49 per $1,000 assessed value for $200,000 home, tax would be $698.

o Vancouver: Estimated 2011 levy rate $3.08 per $1,000 assessed value for $200,000 home, tax would be $616.

That’s what documents at OSPI reveal about Evergreen, Vancouver

Few words, or numbers, incite debate on the merits of a replacement school maintenance and operations tax measure so much as these:

Central administration costs, and their relative bite from a school district budget.

Despite some critics’ claims to the contrary, administrative costs at Evergreen Public Schools are in line with the rest of Washington’s nine largest districts. And they’ve declined a bit this year due to budget reductions imposed last summer.

A check of documents filed with the state Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) finds Evergreen, along with Vancouver, as middle-of-the-pack when it comes to administrative spending among Washington districts with 20,000 or more students.

For central administration alone, Evergreen used 5.7 percent of the $235 million spent in the 2008-09 school year. Add “unit administration” cost — that for all school principals, vice principals and support staff — and total administration cost was 12.3 percent.

Both are middling figures, among Washington’s nine largest districts (see chart).

Vancouver weighed in at 5.5 percent, and 12.2 percent, respectively, for central and total administrative costs.

The rate of administrative overhead is central to one anonymous postcard mailed to several Evergreen district patrons, and at least e-mail circulated. Both disparage Evergreen’s proposed M&O levy.

The postcard flatly states, wrongly, that Evergreen has “the second highest administrative cost in the state,” behind the Seattle district.

A slide show in the e-mail, using similar OSPI data mostly to denounce the Seattle district budget, actually gives credit to decisions made in Evergreen and Vancouver. On one slide (No. 10), both are included in districts noted for spending that has “grown more efficient, or at least moves closely with enrollment,” over time.

A second slide, No. 14, comes up with a fuzzy measure: “students per central office administrator.” For 2008-09, it purports that Evergreen had fewer than 200 students for each central administrator.

And yet, scouring the current Evergreen budget (state Form F-195) unearths the full-time equivalent of 33.813 certificated district administrators, plus another 12.801 FTE in classified employee “director-supervisor” positions.

Combine those two groups — using Evergreen’s latest 25,400 full-time equivalent student count — and that’s 545 students per administrator. (Even with 65.5 principals and vice principals lumped in, the ratio is 226:1.)

By trimming some central positions and support, such as not retaining Susan Enfield, former deputy superintendent, Evergreen sliced administrative spending by more than $1.5 million this year.

That put its estimated administrative costs at 11.94 percent of the total 2009-10 budget.

Vancouver’s stood at 11.87 percent, meanwhile.

The Battle Ground district’s share of 2008-09 budget dollars spent on central and total administrative cost was 5.8 percent (versus an average 6.3 percent for 21 districts with similar enrollment), and 13.2 percent (average 12.0 percent), respectively.

Ballots are due, or must be postmarked, by Feb. 9 for M&O levy measures floated in Woodland, and all but the Green Mountain and Hockinson school districts, across Clark County.

Elections officials Tuesday counted 16,899 returned ballots, raising the two-day cumulative count to 27,743 ballots.