THOMASVILLE, Ala. — The Thomasville City Board of Education approved a $15.6 million budget for fiscal year 2027 on Sept. 8.
Projected revenue totals $15,647,384 and expenditures $15,546,628, for a surplus of $100,756.
Where the Money Comes From
The school system will receive $9.2 million from the state’s foundation program, a figure based on the average number of students from the previous school year. The local fund match — 10 mills — required to receive that funding is $717,200.
Alabama’s Foundation Program is the mechanism through which the state funds basic public education, and the 10-mill local match is a statutory condition of participation. A system that cannot raise the equivalent of 10 mills locally cannot draw its full state allocation, which is why the match appears as a line item rather than as an assumption.
Along with state foundation funding, the school system depends on local revenue — county and district property taxes, county and district sales taxes, a district alcohol tax and city appropriations — to fund additional teachers and staff, transportation, construction and renovation projects, athletics, technology initiatives, school safety and implementation of state standards including professional development and textbooks.
The school system is expected to receive $4.2 million in local revenue for FY2027.
That list explains something about how Alabama school budgets actually work. The state’s foundation allocation funds a baseline of teacher units and support; nearly everything a community recognizes as a feature of its schools — extra staff beyond the state allocation, buses, buildings, athletics, technology — comes out of local revenue.
How the Money Is Spent
Forty-three percent of FY2027 expenditures — $6.795 million — goes to instructional services, which covers the direct interaction between teachers and students.
Twenty-one percent, or $3.2 million, is spent to facilitate and enhance instruction.
Together those categories account for 64 percent of the budget, with the remainder covering administration, operations and maintenance, transportation, food service and debt service.
A Surplus, Narrowly
The projected surplus of $100,756 represents roughly 0.6 percent of the budget — a thin margin, and one that reflects how little discretionary room a system of this size operates with.
Personnel costs dominate school budgets, and they are largely fixed once staffing decisions are made. A surplus under one percent means an unexpected expense of any scale draws on reserves rather than on operating funds.
Other Board Business
In other business at the meeting, the board:
- Approved August’s financial report, including payroll of $991,544.95 and accounts payable of $555,000.17.
- Approved the resignation of Renetha Woods, Child Nutrition Program assistant at Thomasville High School.
- Approved the employment of Terwanna Weatherspoon as a special education teacher at Thomasville Elementary School.
- Approved the employment in a supplemental position of LaToria McCall as assistant girls varsity basketball coach at Thomasville High School.
The August payroll figure of roughly $991,500 is worth noting against the annual budget. Annualized, personnel costs at that level represent the substantial majority of the system’s $15.5 million in expenditures — which is typical for a school district and is the structural reason school budgets have limited flexibility.
Next Meeting
The next meeting of the board is Oct. 27 at 5 p.m. in the Thomasville High School library.