Thread by @Miller4Students

Thread: #Jeffco parents and voters: The district's Capital Improvement Program has spent about $173 million on cost overruns, scope changes, and projects not disclosed to Prop 5B voters in 2018. Let's look at the facts. #edcolo #copolitics #edchat #k12 #edpolicy

In 2018, Jeffco voters approved the issuance of $567 million in bonds to fund a $705 million Capital Improvement Program (CIP). The remaining $138 million was to be provided by the annual transfer of $23 million to the district’s Capital Fund from the General Fund for 6 years.

Of the 705, 56m went to charters, $563m was to be spent on projects at district run schools, and $86m was for "Program Contingency." Each project at a district run school included a 10% "project contingency" to cover cost-overruns and scope changes. If these were > 10% ...

the excess would be charged to "Program Contingency". If the full 10% isn't used, it is added back to Program Contingency. Because of lower interest rates, Jeffco received $118m more in bond proceeds than it had forecast. This is called "bond premium." $11.8 went to charters.

Other districts require that the board decide how to allocate premium. Jeffco instead allocated it to Program Contingency. The @Moss_Adams report criticized this practice.
go.boarddocs.com/co/jeffco/Boar…

Jeffco also earned $12m in interest on unused bond proceeds. So the total amount of money available to spend on district-run schools was 563m (orig budget) + 86m Prog Contingency + (118m-12m premium) + 12m (interest) = $767m. How much of that is still unspent or uncommitted?

The last estimate given to the board was about $31 million (we're getting another update today). The math is stark: We've spent $173 million more than the original $563m budget (767-563-31) on cost overruns, scope changes, and projects not disclosed to Prop 5B voters.

Needless to say, with three years remaining on the Capital Program, I'm looking forward to the latest update on it that the board will receive at today's meeting. And you should be too.