I don't understand why so many PTO/ PTA organizations have the Principals on the bank account. The school has it's money, we have ours. In the past when we have given Principals an "allowance" they have done stuff like buy themselves a laptop two weeks before they resigned, and taken it with them. Sad but true- we no longer give Teachers or the Principal money- they request stuff and we approve or deny the requests in an open meeting. At our school only the PTO president and the PTO Treasurer can write checks or access the funds. The bank statements are printed out and at every meeting, anyone who wants a copy can have one. When it was suggested by the bank that we get a debit card for the account, no one wanted that liability. No one here is eager to have access to PTO money since they are worried about finger pointing in the event of any inconsistencies.
You asked for advice though and here's my 2cents. Only one signer on an account is required to close it. If it were my group I would suggest that we close the current account, and open a new one with just the PTO officers as signees. However hard someone has worked for the $$ that is in the account, it is the organization's money and no employee from the school should have access. Another thing to consider is that in the event that there is a difference of opinion on spending, by giving the Principal access you have given up control.
Are you asking people and business to sponsor you to raise funds? If so our school does several "silent fundraisers" then there are always grants. Let me know if you would like the info about silent fundraisers, or if you are talking about something completely different. I saw at one point in time on here a letter already composed to take to local business for donations, it was very good. I'll try to find it.
We just combined our PTO and also voted a whole new committee. We also are dealing with a new principle. We want to combine funds into one PTO account with signatures from both principles, secretary and president. When we told the new principle, her response to us was she didn't want to do this because the last principle worked hard for this money(PTO money). We had a meeting the other day where she was supposed to come and sign over the funds but she failed to appear to the meeting. What can we do about this? We are really trying to make this PTO work, since previous attempts seemed to fail.
Also, since we are new and don't really know where to start, can anyone help with getting us started?
We need more imformation about getting people and businesses to sponsor us. Any input would be greatly appreciated.
