Having recently passed a bond allowing more revenue for Comstock Public Schools, voters will now know exactly where their money is being spent.
The Kalamazoo district has now joined the growing list of public schools posting their checkbook registers online, said Ken Braun, director of the Mackinac Center's "Show Michigan the Money" project. Braun has been encouraging all 551 public school districts, every charter public school, municipalities and legislators in Michigan to regularly provide this data on their Web sites.
"We like to give the community and taxpayers as much information as possible," said Todd Mora, the director of finance and operations for CPS. "We work hard at being fiscally prudent."
The district also has a large "Transparency Reporting" link on its homepage, which shows budget and salary information. "Anything [the district] can do to build credibility through transparency helps people and the community make informed decisions about [school funding]," said Mora.
The current list of schools known to be posting online check registers at the Show Michigan the Money Web site links to the check registers of 80 conventional school districts, two charter public schools and three intermediate school districts. With many of the state's largest districts on the list, about one of every four public school students attends a public school in Michigan that makes its check register available on the Internet.
To see Comstock Public Schools checkbook register, please click here.
Links to all school district checkbook registers are available at www.mackinac.org/9329.
Michigan Capitol Confidential is the news source produced by the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. Michigan Capitol Confidential reports with a free-market news perspective.