I'm still not sure I understand why anyone would agree to hand any money over to ANYBODY without a reason attached to it!!!
You say you have a budget that has it's expenses listed. Then shouldn't it also have your expected income listed. Like our holiday sale (for the kids to buy Xmas, etc. presents for parents). We have a $1000 expense budget and a $1200 income budget. That means we expect to spend $1000 on items to be sold and expect to bring in $2200 after selling them leaving us a $1200 profit.
I thought a budget had to have an equal amount of income to offset the expenses. So how can they expect you to give them money when you won't know what your income & expenses are until the year is over? We do several fundraisers over the course of the school year. If one does badly, we have to make up for it later on. If one does well, we can back off on the next one. But they can't expect you to know this in the beginning of the year.
Our bylaws also say that any money disbursed over $100 needs to be approved by the membership before being paid. Check your treasurers section for this part.
We are a totally new baord this year dealing with this issue. I was very involved with the PTO last year. So I do know why they decided to do this. I just didn't think it was a good idea and still don't. They had been serving on the board for a few years at that point and had been worn down by the principals constant attempts to control the PTO and constant complaints on what the PTO was spending its money on that they decided to just let the principals have what they wanted and then they would leave us alone. They thought it gave the PTO the added benefit of not having the listen to the teachers complain that we agreed to give this teacher moey for this and not that teacher money for that.
But now we have no control. We have to fix this problem NOW. But I'm not totally sure how to fix it right. Propose totally new bylaws? Make a lot of motions at the next meeting to fix this? It has become a very complicated problem to fix.
As Renee stated I'd also be concerned with just handing over the money so quickly. What if one of your events goes over budget or an expense that you have had for years suddenly gets a huge increase? Then you wouldn't be ending with a $0 balance, you'd be in the whole!
Their point of doing this may be to eliminate the need for voting for every purchase or having ot handle multiple checks or receipts, but I think it could definitely be done in a better way than this. As a parent who works hard to raise funds for my children's schools, I want to know exactly what was purchased with those funds, and I want a say in the decision.
I recommend talking with your board members about the reasoning behind the change. Maybe they just didn't think it through far enough. It might be better to have the principals provide your group with a list of items the schools need and the cost of those items, then have the membership vote on what to purchase. The group could still write one check to each principal but it would be for the amount needed to purchase the approved items. It would give the parents a say in the spending of the money and still eliminate funneling bills and purchase orders through the PTO.
Why? Who thought this up? Our by-laws state that the principal also serves as a liasion between the school & pto. What happens if you need extra funds for something that just came up or want to save for playground equip....? Did they think this would make it easier on the treasurer or lessen the chance of embezzelment? I don't agree with what they've done. I think it takes the control from the pto & gives it to the principals. Good luck.
Our last year's PTO board pushed and passed a new amendment to our bylaws that I believe to be in violation to the bylaws themselves. Now I'm not sure how to procede.
The amendment says that we are to do our fundraiser, subtract out our budget for expenses and events, then cut a check for the remaining money to the principals at the 2 schools that we service. The bylaws say that the principals and adminstration can only serve in an advisory capacity. Isn't this a direct violation? It also means that the PTO has no say in how the money is spent and that we end each year with a $0 balance. This can't be right!
I think we need to scrap our current bylaws altogether and start over. What do you think? Any ideas on how to fix this?
email me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
