District foresees budgetary challenges

Declining enrollment continues to plague the Creston Community School District, complicating budget planning.

With a public hearing and final budgetary decisions scheduled for later this month, the CCSD Board met Wednesday for a budget workshop to review district affairs and how to prepare for the future.

Budgetary planning in previous years showed the district is on a good timeline. However, financial outlooks don’t always account for declining enrollment.

“We don’t have a money problem. Our problem is declining enrollment. That’s changing our financial trajectory,” CCSD Superintendent Deron Stender said. “The board, in all their years, has done a good job of managing the funds to be able to string us out as long as we can.”

Along with keeping expenses low in previous years, Stender referenced the cutting of two staff programs and four teaching positions last year. The superintendent has also submitted a list of possible budget cuts the board for the upcoming fiscal year.

Along with keeping a tight grip on budgetary spending, Stender said he’s proud of how low the district has managed to bring the property tax levy. For 2026, Creston’s levy was $11.77 per $1,000 of assessed value, the lowest of six area schools referenced in the meeting. This levy has gone down almost $5 in the last five years.

Despite all these preparations, there will continue to be challenges ahead. Stender said he expects the levy to go up and budget to go down in the coming years.

“We’re going to be thinking about 2029 going out for a bond to help repair parking lots, driveways and some of the other projects that we don’t have enough money to be able to address,” Stender said. “Every decision you make on those budget proposals that we gave you, anything you don’t do impacts the next year’s budget that you’re looking at. This number doesn’t get smaller. Every year’s number just gets bigger.”

In fact, in preparation, Stender said he’s already working on the next year’s budget.

“Anything you don’t do this year, think that I’m going to be bringing it back to you next year. I already know that,” Stender said. “I am already working on next year’s budget, because of what I know of what’s coming up, to make sure to try to soften the flow again, just like we did last year.”

One way to bring costs down is looking at student activities compared to student numbers. In what Stender called “soft adjustments,” activities like the freshman girls basketball team and freshman football team would be defunct until participation numbers come back up.

However, the possible dissolution of the bowling teams was described as a hard adjustment, something the district did not plan to change in upcoming years.

Since publicizing suggested budgetary adjustments in February, Stender said the main topic he’s heard feedback on was the bowling team.

“Basically what I’ve been asked, and I said I would bring it to the board and the administrative team, and this ask is from parents of the bowling kids, is can they have the opportunity to try to raise the funds to keep the program in place,” Stender said. “$18,000 is a lot to raise. I said, ‘What happens when your child is no longer on a bowling team?’”

While the board is open to the idea, they agreed a time limit would have to be set for raising money in order to be ready in time to create the master schedule with other high schools. Further discussion with parents is planned.

One topic that was still up in the air when the board met on Wednesday was how much of an increase in State Supplemental Aid the state would approve. The following day, Gov. Kim Reynolds signed into law a 2% SSA, previously approved by both House and Senate.

There will be two public hearings regarding the 2026-27 budget as required by Iowa Code. Community members are able to voice their opinions on budgetary topics during these hearings, which take place during regular school board meetings. The first hearing is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. on Monday, March 30. The second will be the same time on Monday, April 27. All school board meetings are held in the AEA boardroom at 257 Swan St.