School finance experts were involved in writing the Declaratory Order to ensure that districts (or AEAs) would be able to continue to meet all of their fiscal obligations while being able to expand purchasing opportunities and funding opportunities by bundling costs for purchasing purposes. The Declaratory Order on page 93 states that “bundling is allowed to the extent that all expenditures are within the meaning of technology as discussed in this declaratory order, are allowed from a single fund, and provide sufficient information to account for the expenditures properly…Nothing about this declaratory order relieves a school district of its obligation to account for all items appropriately and in more contexts than just the fund from which the expenditure was appropriate.”
Bundling is a purchasing concept. For accounting purposes, the district will continue to follow the correct Uniform Financial Accounting coding; for example, functions and objects for accounting and for reporting; will continue to tag/identify each unit of equipment for inventory purposes; and will continue to handle insuring equipment and supplies in the same way it has negotiated with its agent for other equipment and supplies.