What does it cost to run schools? A look at one year of purchases

Many local families plan out an annual budget for the things they know they’ll have to buy, and Dayton Public Schools does the same. But your annual bill for cleaning supplies probably isn’t $600,000.

DPS’ biggest costs are personnel related (well over $100 million per year), but this month the school board will vote on $25 million in purchase requisitions, covering things the district will have to buy in the 2019-20 school year.

All dollar amounts are listed as “not to exceed” the stated amount. DPS Treasurer Hiwot Abraha said that means actual spending for 2019-20 could end up lower than that, or she could have to come back to the school board for approval to go over the purchase order amount, if costs are higher than expected.

So what does it cost to run 25 school buildings serving 12,000 students?

Ten largest individual purchase requests

** $3.50M for food and paper items for student meals, payable to Gordon Food Service

** $2.65M for electricity for district buildings, from Dayton Power & Light

** $1.32M for purchase of 15 school buses, from Ohio Machinery Co.

** $1.20M for fresh produce and grocery for student meals, from W.R. Hackett

** $1.06M for vehicle fuel, including buses, from Hightowers Petroleum

** $931K for contracted speech/language pathologists, from Cumberland Therapy Services

** $900K for lease renewal on high school student laptops, from Hewlett-Packard

** $760K for multiple new vehicles per the fleet replacement plan, from Beau Townsend Ford

** $710K for next-generation telephone services, from Cincinnati Bell

** $600K for dairy items for student meals, from Reiter Dairy of Springfield

10 other big-ticket items

A few of these totals are higher than the “top 10” above, but that’s because the dollar amount comes from combining multiple purchase orders for a single contractor, or for a single service.

** $908K total for eight security camera upgrade contracts (at eight schools), from Graybar Security

** $750K total for natural gas service ($450K from Direct Energy and $300K from Vectren)

APRIL STORY: DPS to close a school, shake up other teaching staffs

** $709K total for a variety of technology services contracts from CDW-Government

** $600K total for custodial supplies ($300K each from Roby Supply and Hillyard)

** $450K for water service from City of Dayton

** $440K for “Property, Liability, Crime, Cyber and Other insurance coverage” from Marsh USA

** $381K for eSchool Plus and Business Plus software from Powerschool

** $353K for student subscriptions and client support for education software, from Mindplay

** $273K for open order to transport special needs students, no contractor named

** $250K to cover any possible insurance deductible for tornado damage, no contractor named

In Other News

Woman pleads guilty in crash that killed veteran in Riverside

Dayton man who attacks mom with small baseball bat gets probation

Buc-ee’s agreement: Lawsuit dropped over water service at Huber Heights...

Ohio’s high court won’t reconsider boneless chicken case against...

Coroner identifies woman who died in Kettering house fire

About the Author

Jeremy P. Kelley

Jeremy Kelley is the assistant news editor for the Dayton Daily News. Jeremy is a Cincinnati native and has lived in the Dayton area for 30-plus years.

Local

$450K water bill? $1.06M for gas? What does it cost to supply Dayton schools?