High fuel prices plus low-mileage school buses equals budget woes for the Re-1 School District.

Re-1 Business Manager Jim Riffey said schools have not escaped the costly fuel and natural-gas prices that everyone else is experiencing.

"We have ‘sweetened’ the utility budget by $75,000 (for this year’s budget) and we’re apprehensive that that’s not going to be adequate for us," Riffey said. "We’re still considering that we may have to go into reserves to put more money into that before it’s over."

Riffey said that although the schools are tax-exempt, prices have risen as much as 27 cents a gallon for gasoline and increased as much as 75 percent for natural gas (purchased from Greeley Gas).

"We’ve not increased the transportation budget," Riffey said. "But we have said to the director, ‘We recognize that you’ve got a problem here that you can’t control. ...and we expect you to need some help with your budget.’

"So we’re going to have to dig into either reserves or some other area. . . to supplement that budget before the year is over," Riffey said.

Re-1 Transportation Director Darell Dennison said there are many factors to be considered with the increased costs of fuel.

"Our price has jumped significantly," Dennison said. "We travel so many miles not only on our daily routes but with activities. And when we budget in activities and fuel mileage, you can’t hardly adjust it."

Dennison said the department has made sure to keep the best interests of the students in mind when making decisions about the budget.

"Either we (transportation) go in the hole or the activities go in the hole," Dennison said. "And so we’ve kind of elected for the transportation portion of it to go in the hole and still continue activities."

Dennison said activity trips that require the buses to fill up somewhere other than at the bus barn increase the costs of fuel even more.

"We’re looking at $1.65 or $1.75 a gallon and that makes the trip that much more expensive," he said.

The school district has 28 bus routes, each averaging approximately 150 miles a day, and the buses get about 11 miles per gallon, Dennison said. "And that’s on our best ones," he said.

On average, the bus barn buys 6,000 gallons of diesel and 2,000 gallons of gas every three weeks.

"So we’re looking at about $7,000 every three weeks just in fuel costs," Dennison said. "

The supplier for fuel varies on who offers the lowest bid the day the bus barn is buying.

"We try and use local suppliers when we can," he said.

Dennison said the prices go up and down just as they do at a gas station.

"All of our suppliers will only guarantee a price until 5 p.m. that day," he said. "It fluctuates day-to-day and even throughout the day. And many times they’ll call back hoping they weren’t the low bidder because the price had gone up."

Despite the high prices and budget adjustments Dennison and Riffey said the needs will be met one way or another.

"We’ve put our projected budget and goals to the wayside so we can furnish fuel for the activities and bus routes," Dennison said.