Physical Plant and Equipment Levy

The voters of the Earlham Community School District will be going to the voting booths on Tuesday, September 13th to cast their ballots for School Board members and for the renewal of the district's Physical Plant and Equipment Levy.  Since I have been asked several times, "What is the PPEL funding going to be used for?", I want to address that in this correspondence.

The Physical Plant and Equipment Levy is a property tax levy that can be used to make improvements to district facilities, purchase or lease/purchase equipment with a value exceeding $500, and other facilities needs of the district.  The following list are examples of actual uses of the PPEL fund:

• Lease of Copy Machines for the District
• Purchase of Musical Instruments
• Replacement of School Pickup
• Replacement of Heating/Ventilation/Air Conditioning Units
• Updating of Fire and Tornado Alarm Systems
• Lease of Technology Equipment/Computers
• Floor Scrubbing Machine
• Plumbing Updates
• Purchase of School Bus

This is not an all inclusive list, but I hope that these examples help to show what type of expenditures are allowed from the PPEL fund.  The current PPEL funding was being used to pay off a Capital Loan Note that was approved by the voters as part of the last building project.  If the School Board would decide that the district needs to provide funding for another building project, the PPEL funds could be used for that purpose again.

The PPEL can not be used to pay salaries, benefits, utilities, textbooks or supplies.  These are examples of expenditures that must be paid from the General Fund.  If the PPEL fund renewal was not approved by the voters, the above listed types of expenditures would probably need to be either delayed or paid for from the General Fund.

For more information from the Iowa Department of Education about PPEL, click this link.