PHILADELPHIA – The Philadelphia school district has been in a well-documented state of financial peril for years.

And the situation is apparently going to get worse in the coming years, according to media reports.

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A recent five-year financial projection, presented to the district’s School Reform Commission in March 2017, shows the district having a negative fund balance of $905 million by fiscal 2022, according to a report from TheNotebook.com.

“The district is looking everywhere to find savings and eke out more revenue,” the news report said. That strategy reportedly includes a plan to close five schools per year, beginning in 2019.

If Philadelphia school officials are really “looking everywhere” for savings, they should definitely notice their travel expenses.

EAGnews.org recently requested travel records from the Philadelphia school district for fiscal year 2017.

That request was not completely granted because no records were returned detailing hotel costs. But the district did provide records that reveal 778 flight-related transactions, totaling $152,631.30, in fiscal 2016-17.

That’s a lot of money to be spent on airlines in one year, at a time when the school district is facing a potential financial nightmare.

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One trip to Denver, in June 2017, involved five transactions for $442.40 apiece, and another six transactions for $496.40 apiece. That totaled $5,190.40.

A trip to St. Louis, in July 2017, included five transactions for $559.40 apiece, another four for $558.42 apiece, and one for $482.40. That all came to $5,513.08.

A trip to Atlanta, in January 2017, involved seven transactions of $482.20 apiece. That totaled $3,375.40.

An airline trip to St. Louis in May 2017, with only the name of Director of Mathematics Joshua Taton attached to the listing on the school document, cost $904.40. A trip to San Antonio in June 2017, with the name of Assistant Superintendent Christopher Lehmann attached, cost $978.60.

The money was not all spent on airline tickets.

The school district travel document listed 206 transactions with the Au Revoir travel agency of Philadelphia, totaling $23,601.90.

The district also listed 252 “agent fee” transactions (no specific travel agency listed) – mostly for $28 apiece – which came to $7,047. That suggests that the district spent $30,648 for professional assistance in booking flights, in an era when just about any individual can easily accomplish that task online.

While $152,631.30 may not seem like a lot of money in a huge school district with a massive billion-dollar budget, it should make taxpayers wonder how a lot of other dollars are spent, and whether Philly school administrators are really tightening their belts as much as possible to avoid financial disaster.