The Oelwein Community School District adopted their fiscal year 2026 budget and approved the installation of a fence around Wings Park’s playgrounds following concerns heard from parents regarding safety at Monday evening’s monthly meeting.
Prior to the beginning of the meeting, however, Oelwein High School Principal Tim Hadley presented the national Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve’s (ESGR) “Above and Beyond Award†to the OCSD Board and Superintendent Josh Ehn. Hadley will be deploying with the military to serve this summer.
“You’ve demonstrated a level of respect and flexibility that goes far beyond what’s expected,†Hadley said. “In the midst of your responsibility to students, families and staff, you made room for one more mission: the mission to support those who serve. That means everything.â€
The award goes towards employers who support service members in their deployment by providing exceptional support beyond what is required.
According to the budget amendment presented, FY2026 will hover around $26,520,141. It was noted in the Board Packet by Ehn that FY2024 resulted in unspent authorized funds of $6,301,178.
“Generally the important message is A, our fiscal house is in order, B, we have cash on hand, and C, our tax rate is going down,†Ehn said.
“The focus continues to be spending down those categorical-restricted balances wisely and then candidly hoarding cash whenever possible,†Business Manager Michael Rueber added. “The more we can make our money work for us and the less we have to go ask for, the better results we see.â€
After approving the 105 Oelwein High School graduates, the school discussed both the annual audit and approved a bid to erect a fence around Wings Park’s playgrounds.
The audit found nothing out of compliance or deficiencies, including the removal of segregation of duties, which is often a common deficiency noted on many audits where staff is small and duties often overlap.
Ehn explained that while some schools opt to budget at the highest possible number that an account can reasonably handle, he believes that budgeting that way at OCSD is not responsible and is unfair to taxpayers that support the district.
“There are some business schools that teach you to flex or max out your accounts to the maximum amount you could possibly ever spend so you would never ever have a report that you under budgeted, and it’s a lazy way to go about school finance,†Ehn said. “We don’t follow that school of thought because it’s not in our fiduciary responsibility, it’s not honest to the taxpayers and it’s not honest to you. We want to give you an honest representation of what we think it’s actually going to take to run the district.â€
The Board approved a bid of $20,264 for a passive fence to enclose Wings Park school. A passive fence does not have gates, but has fences running parallel to one another as an opening. The enclosed options were more expensive than the open concept idea, but provided enough security to prevent Wings Park’s frequent flyers from getting far.
Furthermore, the Board approved a bid of $36,344 to Rogue for weight equipment to soon be used in the Williams Wellness Center’s new weight room coming this summer in the old MercyOne rehabilitation room at the WWC. Around $55K is to be allocated to the project in a span of three years by the Northeast Iowa Community Foundation.
Lastly, a sum of around $9,500 was approved for the Simbli application to be used by the board for meetings and policies. It was proposed at a prior meeting but members needed more information and were not on board with the idea. The module will work with OCSD policies and update them as Iowa Code changes, allowing ease for admin staff and those that compile monthly agendas.
“We really think this is a tool that will help us become efficient and be better managers of our board policies,†Ehn said.
It was approved unanimously and will be implemented later on in the year.
The next board meeting will be held Monday, May 19, at 7 p.m. at the Central Office.
