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I am an Onalaska resident and read your article on the Onalaska School District budget in the Aug. 22 edition. In that article it states that “another place officials will look to cut is in its $250,000 community service budget.”

Please do the community a service and explain in a follow-up to that article whether that $250,000 “community service” budget is an annual budget item and, more importantly, please explain in some detail what the types of expenditures are that are billed to that budget line item.

The $250,000 amount is half the additional $500,000 per year that taxpayers have approved be spent by the district. I’m concerned that a “community services” line item in a budget can be interpreted/used very broadly. That’s not to say that there is, in fact, an issue, but as a taxpayer, I’d like to understand what that line item is used for.

I voted for the additional $500,000 per year spending by the district and am fully supportive of educational spending but have dealt with enough budgetary matters to be very much concerned by a “community services” line item in a school district budget, particularly in the amount of $250,000.