At the Aug. 24 Issaquah School District Board of Directors meeting, the board unanimously approved the 2016-17 fiscal year budget, officially setting the school year in motion.

Jake Kuper, district finance director, had presented the budget to the board at the Aug. 10 meeting, when the board conducted a public hearing for the budget. No one had given input during the public hearing, and Kuper said that “there has been no additional public comment on the budget” since then.

“This is the end of a very long process — I begin the budget in October,” Kuper stated, adding, “I just want the public to know that there is a lot of scrutiny and board involvement in the oversight of the creation of the budget and its progression.”

The budgeted revenue for the 2016-17 fiscal year is $232.3 million, while the budgeted expenditures amount to $235.4 million. Kuper said at the public hearing that a gap of this size at the start of the fiscal year is normal for the district, and that it simply accounts for the additional revenues that are typically received throughout the year, such as unexpected enrollment growth and gifts.

Filling state and federal funding gaps was a common theme at the hearing. Approximately 63.9 percent of the district’s revenue will come from the state; although as a portion of the whole this is a 0.8 percent increase from the 2015-16 fiscal year, it is still 4 percent less than the 2008-09 fiscal year, when the state provided 68 percent of the district’s revenue.

The board approved the budget just in time for the start of the new school year on Sept. 1. Eight days out from the big day, Superintendent Ron Thiele, along with his administrative staff, confirmed to the board that Issaquah schools would be ready to go.

Thiele, who has been frequenting the revamped Sunny Hills Elementary, the new Issaquah Middle School building and the all-new high school Gibson Ek, was happy to report that the they would “all be ready to open Sept. 1. I am very confident in that and my confidence grows with each day,” he said.

“All of our teachers have what they need to start the year,” Assistant Superintendent of Teaching and Learning Services Emilie Hard added.

Kuper updated the board on enrollment, noting that the projected growth of students was 450, with an aggregate growth of 1,150 if kindergartners are included. According to Kuper, the average elementary school in the district contains 620 students, and the average middle school has 960. Issaquah High School has a student body of 2,350 (2,125 FTE); Skyline High School comes in a bit smaller with 2,250 (2,050 FTE).

“Those average school sizes … are not what we want,” Thiele said. “That’s why we have plans to build another high school … and a sixth middle school — we don’t want to run our middle schools at nearly 1,000 per building.”

The district has been getting creative to compensate for a teacher shortage, including emergency and conditionally certifying new teachers who have only bachelor’s degrees, extending and expanding contracts, having larger classes and hiring substitutes to fill in as new teachers get their credentials.

“We will have a teacher in every classroom in front of every student to start the first day of school,” said Lisa Hechtman, executive director of Human Resources.

Thiele said the problem is not attracting teachers, but retaining them for long periods. He surmised that this is due to the expensive housing prices in Issaquah, noting that teachers tend to leave when they are ready to settle down, get married and buy a home.

“I am becoming increasingly concerned about what the cost of living, particularly the cost of housing in our area, is doing to us in terms of being able to [retain staff],” he said.

Despite the staffing struggles, Thiele said that the beginning of the school year is looking positive, especially judging by the attitudes of teachers on day one of the Issaquah School District conference on Aug. 24.

“A lot of excitement is building,” Thiele said.