Taxpayers of the Butler School District are entitled to their opinions about the school board's decision regarding use of $742,947 in additional state funds for the 2011-12 fiscal year. But district taxpayers should by troubled over how the decision was made.

Board members made their decision — not to reopen the district's 2011-12 budget and save the money to beef up the district's reserve fund — by way of a telephone poll, not at a meeting open to the public.

That poll, if not a direct violation of the state's Sunshine Law, at least violated the spirit of that law.

The board's decision came from a trio of options that also included:

• Reopen the budget and use the money to rehire paraprofessionals whose positions were eliminated to help balance the new budget, and for other expenditures.

• Reopen the budget and use the money to reduce the 1.67-mill property tax increase approved to help balance the new fiscal year's spending package.

Like the state, school districts operate under a fiscal calendar beginning each July 1 and ending the following June 30.

The additional money that the Butler district will be receiving for 2011-12 results from the state Legislature's decision to increase school districts' subsidy amounts over what Gov. Tom Corbett proposed in the 2011-12 state budget plan that he introduced in March.

Although the phone poll really isn't official until the action is formally ratified at a board meeting, the public was cheated by not being given the opportunity to influence the thinking of board members during an open discussion prior to a decision being made. Meanwhile, there was no hurry-up deadline necessitating a telephone poll.

Taxpayers have good cause to wonder how much other important district decision making is going on outside of their view and without their opportunity to voice opinions or concerns.

Tom King, district solicitor, has contended that the board did nothing wrong because "the decision to do nothing is not a violation of anything."

But the key word in his response is "decision." Under the Sunshine Law, the board is not permitted to make money decisions without providing prior opportunity for public input.

The fact that the district confirmed the decision before any formal action suggests that the board did violate the Sunshine Law.

"The Butler School Board decided not to reopen its budget," King said.

The additional $700,000 in question is not a huge financial windfall that would make a big difference in Butler's 2011-12 operation. The district's new budget totals $90.4 million.

Regardless, the money, because of the options available for its use, carried with it an opportunity for public input that the board chose not to give the district's taxpayers.

District taxpayers should be unhappy — troubled, even — about the school board's attitude toward them.