A major mistake in estimated BEP funding for schools was due to faulty information from the county, according to Wesley Robertson, Executive Director of Local Finance for the state Department of Education. “They submitted incorrect ADMs (average daily memberships/enrollment) and he (the Director of Schools) signed off on them,” Robertson said. State BEP money is based on a complicated formula including various elements to determine enrollment, with additional money provided for growth from one year to the next.

Jones reported two weeks ago that he had been told in January that the county would receive $989,000 in growth money, with half the money submitted to the county in February, but learned at the end of the year that the amount was wrong and the county will have to pay back the money already sent. He said he had asked about the amount, which is normally around $50,000, and was told it was correct.

Robertson said Monday that the amount was based on incorrect information. He pointed out that the letter sent in January indicated that adjustments could be made before the final payment is made. Jones said the system did not spend the anticipated second half of the money, but the first half was spent, including pay raises.

Robertson said school system officials might have talked to him early in the year but he did not remember for sure, noting he deals with all the school systems. “If they did, I wouldn’t have told him to go out and spend it,” he said, adding “We never tell anybody to spend growth money unless they’re sure the ADM is correct, that they’re sure they are growing.”

Robertson said school system officials came to Nashville in June to talk about the situation. “We walked them through what they need to do in the future to stay on top of it,” he said.

Jones said the miscalculation came from the formula used for vocational students. He said he, budget director Treva Hyatt and attendance supervisor Laura Barnett had all asked state officials to review the calculations because the amount looked too high. He said they have copies of emails from the state saying the calculations were correct.

Barnett said school systems received a letter early in January advising them to make sure their attendance numbers were consistent, so she called and asked about the number in Polk. She was told it looked like the ADM was up about 50, which seemed to be in line. However, while the ADM portion of the BEP formula was correct, the vocational numbers were not.

Barnett explained that the error came from a problem in the attendance software, which includes the formula for calculating payments for vocational students. As it turned out, one piece of the formula was missing, so it counted each time a student attended class as a separate student. As a result, the total number of vocational students was reported as considerably higher than it should be, Barnett said. She said she just plugs the local numbers into the formula on the state attendance website and does not see the end results.

“I trusted that the computer reports were right,” she said. The higher number of vocational students showed a need for additional teachers, so the projected growth money included funds for additional payroll.

Barnett said the state Help Desk advised her in January that the vocational numbers seemed to be too high. She called the software vendor and asked them to check it out and they found that the vocational formula was missing a critical piece of information. They did not know how it happened. Barnett said the county notified the state in late February of the miscounting. Jones said the county was not advised that this would have a significant impact on the BEP funds until June. “We did everything we knew to do,” he said.

Robertson said the school system did call when the mistake was found but noted the state does not make BEP adjustments until the June payment.

At the meting with state officials, Jones said, “We mutually agreed that each of us should have caught the mistake.” He said there are safeguards in place to be sure it doesn’t happen again. Jones said state officials were very helpful when they went to Nashville and are working with the county every way they legally can, allowing the payback to be made over several years.