ICCSD Financial KPIs — Three Methodologies, FY2015–FY2025
Iowa City CSD and 14 benchmarked peer districts, under the district's own internal ratios,
Moody's, and S&P — grouped by financial area · audited ACFRs + official Iowa filings (ICCSD FY2025 from management reporting; its FY2024 audit was filed June 2026)
Each KPI is charted three ways' worth of context at once. The blue line is Iowa City;
the dashed slate line is the 14-peer average; faint gray lines are the individual peers.
The shaded background is the rating band the value sits in — Moody's Aaa→Caa, S&P 1→6, or the
internal target (green = strong, amber = caution, red = concern) — so you can read the grade by color. Use
Show the 15-district table for exact numbers.
Executive summary
Across all three rating lenses, Iowa City sits at or near the bottom of its 15-district peer group on the measures that matter most — spending authority, reserves, liquidity, and staffing costs. The newly filed FY2024 audit confirms a partial rebuild in reserves off the FY2023 low, but the district stays in the bottom group on every core measure, and its FY2025 audit is still unfiled.
Spending authority is the thinnest in the group. Iowa City's Unspent Authorized Budget — Iowa's single most important health measure — clawed back to just 1.64% of its limit in FY2024 after dipping below zero in FY2023 (the unlawful, state-review SBRC level). Even rebuilt, it is still the lowest of 15 districts (peer median 15%).
Reserves and cash sit near the bottom of the group. In FY2024 its solvency (8.07%, rank 12 of 14), available fund balance (7.8% of revenue) and day's-cash (41.2 days) all rank in the bottom group (peer medians ≈16%, 16% and 97 days; the internal cash target is 90). The cash-reserve levy drove the rebuild off the FY2023 trough (solvency 2.4%), but self-reported FY2025 figures already slip back toward it (solvency ≈6.02%, ≈33.3 days of cash).
Staffing costs are near the highest of 15. Salaries and benefits were 84.8% of the General Fund in FY2024 (rank 14 of 15; peer median 78%) — the classic Iowa squeeze of personnel costs climbing as enrollment flattens, the leading pressure behind the spending-authority decline.
Leverage runs above the peer norm. Long-term liabilities (debt + pension + OPEB) were 188.1% of GF revenue in FY2024 vs a 93% peer median; the district carries both GO and SAVE sales-tax debt from its Facilities Master Plan.
The books are finally moving, but still late and flagged. ICCSD filed its long-overdue FY2024 audit in June 2026 — about two years after year-end — and it carries five financial-statement material weaknesses plus qualified opinions on two federal programs. Its FY2025 audit is still unfiled, so the district remains the furthest behind of the 15.
All figures trace to audited ACFRs or Iowa state filings; ranks are among the 15 districts in FY2024 (ICCSD's most recent audited year). FY2025 figures are management/unaudited.
① ICCSD Internal
The district's own
Ten-Point Financial Condition Test — Iowa-specific ratios (solvency, day's cash, employee-cost,
unspent-balance) from its Annual Financial Health Report.
② Moody's
US K-12 Public School
Districts scorecard (Jul 2024). We compute the audit-derivable sub-factors and color each by its Moody's
alpha band (Aaa–Caa).
③ S&P
Methodology for Rating
US Governments (Sep 2024). Financial factors colored by S&P's 1–6 assessment scale.
ICCSD's FY2025 (its most recent year) is dashed with a hollow dot — management/unaudited (that audit isn't filed yet; the FY2024 audit was filed June 2026).
1. Cash & Liquidity
Can the district pay its bills through the year? Cash on hand and short-term solvency.
⚠ ICCSD FY2024 is audited (ACFR filed June 2026; GF cash $22.5M, ≈41 days). FY2025 uses management figures: its FY2025 Certified Annual Report reports GF cash of $43.7M (≈75 days) and a GF fund balance of $18.3M (unassigned $12.3M) — both audited-style and internally consistent. PFM's lower $19.4M figure (≈33 days, shown here) reconciles to the FY24 year-end balance ($19,366,903), i.e. a prior-year/usable-cash measure, not FY25 ending cash. Either way the usable fund-balance cushion is thin (~$12–18M).
Formula: GF current assets / (GF current liabilities + deferred inflows)
bad <90ok 90–100good ≥100
Receivables & Inventory Ratio
Internal◦ context
Formula: (GF total receivables + inventory) / GF current assets
⚠ In Iowa this is dominated by the succeeding-year property-tax receivable (offset by a matching deferred inflow), so it runs high (~70–80%) and is shown as context. The district's own published ratio (~10%) uses a narrower receivables figure that excludes that item.
Formula: 3-year average of (GF revenue − GF expenditure, net transfers) / GF revenue
4 <-33 -3–02 0–31 ≥3
Employee Cost Ratio
Internal◦ context
Formula: (GF salaries + benefits) / total GF expenditures
⚠ Iowa General Funds report expenditures by FUNCTION, not object, so salaries+benefits aren't separable from most audited GF statements. Filled from: ICCSD FY15–19 (its own report), the Iowa DE Certified Annual Report object detail for FY23–24 (all districts, incl. ICCSD — the CAR is filed even when the audit is late), and a few districts whose audits publish object detail. FY20–22 gaps reflect data availability, not oversight.
good <80ok 80–85bad ≥85
Foundation Aid Ratio
Internal◦ context
Formula: Direct state foundation aid / total GF revenue
Context measure — no rating band. Benchmark: no fixed target (falls as property wealth grows)
Student Transportation Ratio
Internal↓ better
Formula: Student transportation expenditure / total GF expenditures (CAR)
Context measure — no rating band. Benchmark: no fixed target
Investment Income Ratio
Internal↑ better
Formula: GF interest/investment income / total GF revenue
Context measure — no rating band. Benchmark: higher better
GF Expenditure per Pupil
Internal◦ context
Formula: Total GF expenditures / certified enrollment
Context measure — no rating band. Benchmark: efficiency context vs state avg
Local Revenue Share (Contribution)
Internal◦ context
Formula: GF local-source revenue / total GF revenue
Context measure — no rating band. Benchmark: local taxation effort
5. Leverage & Debt
Long-term obligations (debt + pension + OPEB) and the annual fixed-cost burden they create.
Long-term Liabilities Ratio
Moody's↓ better
Formula: (direct debt + net pension liab + net OPEB liab) / operating revenue
⚠ Uses REPORTED GASB NPL/OPEB, not Moody's discount-rate-adjusted ANPL/ANOPEB; operating revenue proxied by GF revenue.
⚠ Implied debt service = prior-yr debt / 20-yr level annuity at the implied muni rate; pension cost uses actual contribution where tread-water not computable. ICCSD FY25 uses actual debt service from the CAR but ESTIMATED pension/OPEB contributions (FY25 audit not filed); ICCSD FY24 is blank (no audit or CAR).
Formula: (actual debt service P&I + pension contribution + OPEB contribution) / total governmental revenue
⚠ Uses ACTUAL debt service, so bond-refunding years spike (S&P removes such distortions); the Moody's Fixed-Costs Ratio above (implied 20-yr debt service) is the refunding-robust comparator. ICCSD FY23 reflects a refunding; ICCSD FY25 uses CAR debt service + ESTIMATED pension/OPEB (FY25 audit not filed).
Formula: Any finding repeated from the prior year (not remediated)
N
Audit Filing Lag
Shared↓ better
Formula: Months from fiscal year-end (June 30) to audit report date
Context measure — no rating band. Benchmark: filed within statutory window (~3–6 mo)
GFOA / ASBO Recognition
Shared↑ better
Formula: District submits for and earns the GFOA Certificate of Achievement for Excellence in Financial Reporting (some hold ASBO instead)
⚠ Tracks the GFOA certificate flag; a 'N' may still hold the ASBO Certificate of Excellence (e.g. Dubuque, Linn-Mar) — recognition, not a deficiency.
Y = earns GFOA Certificate of Achievement (or ASBO)
Data Basis
Context◦ context
Formula: audited ACFR vs management/unaudited actual vs projected
Context measure — no rating band. Benchmark: audited > management/unaudited
Qualitative / external factors — named, not scored
Rating-agency factors that can't be derived from audited
financials. For all Iowa districts the institutional framework is the same: a state-determined revenue
framework (the foundation formula caps spending authority; local voters add ISL, PPEL, SAVE).
Methodology
Factor
Weight
Why external/qualitative
Moody's
Resident Income (MHI adj for RPP / US MHI)
10%
Needs Census ACS median household income + BEA regional price parity — external, not in audits.
Moody's
Full Value per Capita
10%
Needs district POPULATION (not enrollment). Valuation-per-pupil is shown instead as an Iowa-appropriate proxy.
Moody's
Institutional Framework
10%
Qualitative & identical statewide: Iowa is a STATE-DETERMINED revenue framework (foundation formula caps spending authority) with limited voter-approved local supplements (ISL, PPEL, SAVE). Analyst-assigned, same for all Iowa districts.
S&P
Economy (county GCP per capita, PCPI)
20%
Needs county gross product & per-capita personal income vs US — external macro data, not in audits.
S&P
Management
20%
Qualitative assessment of budgeting, long-term planning, policies — read from governance, not a single ratio.
S&P
Institutional Framework
anchor
S&P assigns an IF by state/government type; same for all Iowa school districts.
Notes
Sources. Audited ACFRs (FY15–23 ICCSD; FY15–25 peers), Iowa DOM (UAB, enrollment, valuations, levies),
the Certified Annual Report (function detail FY17–23), and ICCSD's Annual Financial Health Report (FY15–19 internal
ratios, verbatim). ICCSD's FY2025 audit is not filed; that year uses management/unaudited actuals (PFM). Its FY2024 audit was filed June 2026 and is included as audited.
GF cash uses General-Fund cash (not all-funds), so day's-cash ties to the district's published series.
Operating revenue for Moody's/S&P ratios is proxied by General Fund revenue. Long-term-liabilities uses
reported GASB pension/OPEB, not Moody's discount-rate-adjusted figures.
Per-capita vs per-pupil. Net direct debt / pension are scored per capita by the agencies; shown here
per pupil (context, no band) since audits don't carry population.
S&P current cost uses actual debt service, so refunding years spike; the Moody's fixed-costs ratio (implied debt service) is the refunding-robust comparator.