This may not help you this year, but:
Our PTO asks for proposals from the teachers and staff at the beginning of each school year. (We usually give them until Oct 1 to turn them in.) Then we form a committee to review them and recommend how our funds should be spent. We found that taking all the proposals to the entire board gets way to crazy. People have their own agendas, and not everyone looks at what is best for the school. We also sit down with the principal and review our school improvement plan to see where we can make the best use of our funds.

My approach might be to determine an amount of money that you might reasonably expect to raise, based on past years' experiences. Have everyone, the parents, teachers and principle make suggestions. When looking at the whole budget, ask the group what percentage of the budget should go to teacher requests, and also determine if there is a pressing item(s) that needs priority. Maybe work backwards with what you think you have available in funds, establish the priority items, then choose among the rest for the remainder of the funds.

In our by-laws we specifically stated up to a certain $ level that the board can make the decision, anything over that has to go to a vote. You do not have to necessarily get everything on a wish list - and remember that (I'm taking liberties here) purchases should be for the good of the school and not just a specific group. Good luck and I'll look forward to hearing how you resolved this. (By the way - the school where my kids currently go there is a problem with the principal being too involved - TELLING - or I guess more appropriately strongly suggesting - how the PTO is to spend it's money. The board doesn't have much spine and is letting the principal dictate how the money is spent. We're changing schools fall 2002 and I'll be a whole lot more involved than I have been to date. Our new principal realizes the relationship between PTO and school - we raise the money - they ASK not TELL and we do the best we can. Funny how a good relationship from the start helps things along.

I am the new president for the next year. I don't want to run into the same problem we had this last meeting. The principal supplied a list of items that the teachers would "like" to see. The meeting was a disaster! People complained about some of the items requested. Some indicated the amounts seemed high. I did a survey with the parents and teachers. I received some good ideas from parents and only 3 responses from teachers. Should I include the items that didn't get voted on this last meeting or should i just drop them. We want to vote at our next meeting so we can decide on our fundraisers. I think its all in how its presented to the members but I'm not sure how to do it! HELP!