Re: The ACE Fee
Absolutely no snark intended here, I just don’t understand the basics. Based on the reponse from HPISD yesterday and a brief cover letter on the form letting parents know they needed to pay a $250 ACE fee, I assumed the funds collected for athletics (ACE) were put in a special account for, well, sports and stuff. But in this report it looks like the money ($400,000 last year) goes into one giant account. Can a super informed reader tell me how this works?
And a side question for someone with the scoop: It looks like this year HPISD plans to take in $80,000 less in ACE fees than they did last year. I wonder why?
UPDATE. Readers have asked for the cover letter mentioned above:
State school finance legislation continues to adversely impact Highland Park Independent School District’s ability to fund all academic and extracurricular programs, so we must fund our athletic program in unique and creative ways. Once again, we are asking for your financial support.
The Athletic Commitment to Excellence (ACE) fee is an annual fee for each student participant in extracurricular sports. A student may participate in more than one sport with no additional fee, but there is no discount for multiple students from the same family.
The ACE Fee was instituted in 1994-1995 and was $300 through the 1996 school year. For the 2010-2011 school year the ACE Fee will be $250.
After teams are selected, and prior to a student’s participation as a team member, ACE fees will be collected. Fees may be paid by check and collected by the coach, or, paid on-line by credit card. Children of HPISD district employees are exempt from the fee. Parents with special financial circumstances should discuss payment options with their coaches prior to the start of the 2010-2011 school year. Families can be assured of confidentiality regarding payment arrangements of the ACE Fee. All efforts will be made to ensure that all students who wish to participate are given the opportunity.
Our desire is to ensure the same standard of excellence for our athletic programs that exist for our academic programs. In our efforts to continue this excellence we must combine current resources with participation fees and private funding. We will work to maintain the quality of our existing programs, increase participation, and add new programs whenever appropriate. We will always be good stewards of financial resources and serve this community to the very best of our ability.
2010-2011 Budget
Revenues $122MM
Recapture $70MM
That’s all you need to see
I have to pay this twice this year(2x last year).
I was told it was for the buses. Didn’t question it much. I should have. Shame on me for not being more thorough.
Thank you Merritt!
The Morning News reports that the Allen ISD is starting work on a new $60 million dollar football stadium this morning. Do they have an ACE fee?
Merrit, if your child wants to be on the swim team you only have to pay the $250 ACE fee and the $125 Blue Wave fee. Of course, you will also have to buy their team swim suit, caps, goggles, polo shirts and warm-ups. And, if you are really into it, you can pay to have to locker rooms redone so that more than two showers will work.
@Jack Fee – No, Allen does not have an ACE fee. Also, they are not considered a property rich district and do not contribute funds to Recapture. Instead the state sends them a nice big check for $60 million. Almost as much as the $71million they collect in property taxes. Complete scam.
http://www.allenisd.org/20061061015583133/lib/20061061015583133/Allen_ISD_2010-2011_PROPOSED_Budget_Summary.pdf
@dk, I realize I’m over a decade late to this topic but http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qw9oX-kZ_9k
Is that link really telling me that Allen gets more than 58 million this year from other districts? What? Allen isn’t poor.
I’m not positive the state funds come from the Recapture program – they could also come from the state sales tax or the lottery.
The reason Allen is able to build the huge stadium is the dual isd property taxes, one for operations (maxes out at 1.5) and one for debt service (maxes out at .5).
So the money for the stadium doesn’t come out of the operations budget.
This website does a pretty good job of explaining the state allocation formulas:
http://www.investintexasschools.org/schoolfunding/current.php
Let’s do the math. The fee has been in place since 1994. 400K a year. My quesstimate is close to 6.4 million since inception. Good thing they dont base it on “playing time”
Do all of the teams, a la swimming, purchase their own uniforms and warm-ups?
There is basically a giant pot of money for the entire district for both academic and athletic needs. I believe this is where ACE fees are funneled, and then the individual sports draw out money for transportation, referees, etc.
The ACE fee is a giant slush fund and only gets the kids the privilege to play. The parents pay additionally for uniforms, meals on game or travel days, etc. Pity the poor soul that makes a FOIA request during football season–Coach Allen will not be a happy camper!!