A budget presentation by the Woodland Park School District made to the Woodland Park City Council on Thursday turned contentious at best and hostile at worst.

The altercation included assertions of non-transparency, fraud and “shenanigans.”

The school board had agreed to do a budget report to the council as part of the new intergovernmental agreement between the parties over a 1.09% sales tax that the city collects and is earmarked for the school district.

The sales tax revenue represents 11% of the district’s $3.23 million budget.

Amid council’s allegations of foot dragging on the part of the board to renew the IGA, an ordinance was proposed on Feb. 15 that would eliminate the tax. A work session between council and the board was quickly agreed upon and held on Feb. 29.

The new IGA was signed on March 26. Rather than removing the proposed ordinance, council opted to continue it until July.

At Thursday’s meeting Superintendent Ken Witt presented a pair of rudimentary pie charts outlining, in very general terms, the percentage of the district’s budget proposed to be allocated to six broad categories.

The district budget was presented as preliminary. The budget will be formally approved by the school board in June.

Councilmembers Carrol Harvey and George Jones asked for, and received, clarification concerning teachers’ salaries and a few expenses.

Councilmember Teri Baldwin wasn’t as cordial.

“I am sorely disappointed in this pie chart,” she said. “I would really like to see some line items; some accountability for how you’re spending taxpayer money.

“I came from two of the largest school districts in Colorado, so I’m very familiar with how school boards are supposed to work and how superintendents are supposed to work. And this isn’t it.”

Councilmember Jeffrey Geer, who has a child in the district, upped the ante, calling the presentation “completely inadequate and ridiculous.”

“We’ve been getting a tremendous amount of feedback from the community that you no longer need this tax and that we, as council, should discontinue it as quickly as we can,” Geer said to Witt. “I’ve watched my kid’s quality of education decline since you’ve taken over as superintendent. Why should the community of Woodland Park continue to fund this amount of discomfort and distaste in your specific behavior and the behavior of the existing board?”

Woodland Park School Board President Mick Bates responded.

“I’m going to be perfectly frank with you as well,” Bates said to Geer. “I believe that there are a number of people in the community that are attempting to use these monies to punish this board.

“I want to be very clear that the only people who would get punished by this being taken away are our children.”

Geer brushed off Bates’ explanation and launched into an attack on the American Birthright Standard for social studies, which is used in Woodland Park.

Geer characterized one assignment his child, an eighth grader, brought home as having to “explain why not all slavery was bad.”

The allegation drew gasps from the audience.

“I know saying (repealing the tax) is going to hurt the kids plays really well publicly because none of us up here want to harm kids,” Geer said. “But that’s just a sound bite.”

Baldwin suggested a forensic audit, to which Witt responded that the district is audited every year by the Colorado Department of Education.

“I know what the CDE requires and it’s skeletal compared to a forensic audit,” she said. “They’re not looking for fraud.”

Toward the end of the meeting, Geer called for a consensus to bring the school sales tax repeal ordinance to the agenda for the next city council meeting rather than waiting for July.

That proposal found no traction as other councilmembers said the public needed more time to weigh in.

Harvey pointed out that more information would be needed on the consequences of repealing the tax. Mayor Kellie Case said that the tax was put in place by a vote of the people and that should be considered.

In the end, council decided a work session would be needed to clarify a number of objectives, including exactly what level and types of reporting would satisfy all councilmembers and the citizens.

The date of that session is yet to be determined.

“I feel it’s incumbent upon somebody to get to the bottom of the shenanigans,” said Baldwin without defining the shenanigans.

Harvey advocated for a work session, imploring council to look into how the tax came about, what the citizens’ goals were when they voted it in and whether those goals were still being served.