Dearest reader,

Welcome to The Ledger by Lady Budgetdown.

If you arrived here from Facebook, you already know that I have a habit of following breadcrumbs, opening spreadsheets, asking uncomfortable questions, and occasionally wondering why a perfectly innocent number has decided not to behave itself.

The Ledger is where all of that work gets organized.

Facebook is wonderful for conversation. It is considerably less wonderful as a filing cabinet.

Posts disappear down the timeline. Documents get buried. Updates become separated from the original research. Corrections can be difficult to find. And after hundreds of school districts and an increasingly unreasonable number of spreadsheets, even my spectacles and abacus needed a better system.

So I built one.

The Ledger is the organized research archive of Lady Budgetdown.

Michigan school districts are arranged by region → county → individual school district. Inside those district boards, you will find the research that has been published about that district: financial reviews, staffing data, compensation information, budgets, audits, public records, FOIA responses, follow-ups, corrections, and the receipts supporting the work.

The purpose is not to declare every large number bad, every increase suspicious, or every school district guilty of something.

Sometimes the ledger raises questions.

Sometimes it finds something genuinely concerning.

And sometimes a district opens beautifully and the numbers make perfect sense. I rather enjoy those.

The receipts lead. I follow.

If you're new here, spend a few minutes in the rest of the About The Ledger section. You'll find explanations of how the research works, what sources I use, how corrections are handled, what is and is not covered, why Lady Budgetdown remains anonymous, and how readers can support the project.

After that, open The Ledger, find your region, find your county, and find your school district.

You are welcome to read the receipts yourself. In fact, I hope you do.

This project has never been about asking readers to simply trust Lady Budgetdown.

It is about making the information accessible enough that you don't have to.

Bring your questions. Bring your breadcrumbs. Bring your spectacles if necessary.

The ledger is open. 🪶

— Lady Budgetdown

With receipts and respect.