School district still waiting for Katrina money|[3/31/06]
Published 12:00 am Friday, March 31, 2006
The Vicksburg Warren School District is still awaiting cash from Katrina, Superintendent James Price said during the Board of Trustees meeting Thursday.
The district was promised $225,000 of $14 million allotted to Mississippi from the U.S. Department of Education at the beginning of March.
The money is to pay for six months of accommodating about 400 students displaced from the coastal areas by the August 2005 storm. About 100 of those students remain enrolled.
“Essentially $35,000 of that money will go to our private and parochial schools, so that leaves $190,000 we’re still waiting on. We have received not 1 cent,” Price said.
The money will pay for additional salaries, transportation costs, textbooks and supplies, he said.
“The state department has no inkling as to when or how we’ll get it,” he said. “So we’ll just respond as it comes.”
Price said the approaching end of the legislative session will trigger budget work.
“We’re waiting on the Mississippi Adequate Education Program funding to know what funding level we’ll be, so right now we’re still in limbo,” Price said.
“But, hopefully, we’ll know something in the next few weeks and be able to start preparing for the budget,” he said.
The district operates on fiscal years starting each July 1.
In other meeting business, the board: