The Board of Education’s Finance and Infrastructure Committee this week rejected a proposal by education officials to divvy up nearly $15 million worth of imposed budget restrictions, citing concerns that school-based funding would take the biggest hit.

The board’s chairman and vice chairman asked the Department of Education to instead consider de-funding vacant positions or further reducing administrative expenses.

“I’m very concerned about the fact that your biggest cut is coming out from the weighted student formula,” BOE Chairman Lance Mizumoto said during a committee meeting Tuesday. “I just don’t see enough progress being made to cut the administrative areas in order to provide continued support for the weighted student formula.”

An external audit of DOE finances showed the department spent 97 percent of governmental funds on “school-related expenses” in fiscal year 2014, with less than 3 percent spent on state and complex area administration costs.

More than 50 percent of the DOE’s general-fund budget goes toward the so-called weighted student formula, or per-pupil funds. The formula assigns “weights” to students based on their needs so that schools with higher enrollments of economically disadvantaged, special education or other special-needs students will get more of the money along with schools with higher populations of English-language learners and transient students.

This year, the funding amounts to $829 million based on enrollment of about 173,000 students. Principals have discretion over the funds, which are mainly used for payroll. They can also cover special projects and programs or supplies and equipment.

Amy Kunz, the DOE’s chief financial officer, presented a plan Tuesday to the Finance Committee, showing how the department would absorb a 10 percent budget restriction imposed on state departments by the governor’s office due to economic uncertainties. The restriction is on the discretionary portion of the department’s general-fund budget.

Gov. David Ige, in a memorandum last month to state department heads, said that although the state’s economy is showing growth, “it is crucial that we recognize that the state’s expenditures are anticipated to outpace revenues this fiscal year and in the upcoming biennium.”

The DOE’s restrictions amount to $14.7 million for the fiscal year that began July 1. The department emphasized that these are restrictions, or funds being temporarily withheld, and not budget cuts.

“The restriction plan spreads out the cuts … in order to minimize severely impacting any one program or specific office,” schools Superintendent Kathryn Matayoshi wrote in a memo Tuesday to the committee.

Kunz said the department has identified about $4.8 million within the DOE’s budget to help offset the restrictions. That would include $3.5 million in carryover balances and $1.3 million in federal Compact of Free Association reimbursement funding. (The COFA funds are an annual “tax replacement” the state receives to mitigate overall impacts of Micronesian migrants to Hawaii.)

If the board were to approve using those funds to offset the reductions, the DOE still faces $9.9 million in restrictions this year. Under the DOE proposal, so-called school-based budgeting, which includes weighted student formula funds, would be reduced by $4.3 million, representing the largest restriction.

Of that amount, weighted student formula funds would be restricted by $3.7 million. But that reduction would actually be on the fund’s reserves, because all of this year’s per-pupil money has been allocated to schools, Kunz said.

Mizumoto said, “I’m not sure I understand the rationale behind cutting such a large amount, regardless of whether it’s a reserve.”

Other proposed restrictions under the plan the board deferred include:

» School support: $2.5 million (including reductions to food service administration, school custodial services and facilities maintenance branch).

» Instructional support: $1.5 million (including reductions for coordinated support and teacher performance evaluation system).

» State administration: $1.3 million (including reductions to accounting services, procurement services and criminal history check).

Brian De Lima, BOE vice chairman, suggested restoring the weighted student formula restriction and instead reducing the department’s utility budget by that amount.

But Kunz said, “With all of the extreme heat right now and with what we’re doing, trying to get relief into these classrooms with the fans and portable ACs, I do not feel at this time that we should be restricting the utilities budget.”

De Lima also suggested the department consider restricting funds for administrative positions that are vacant but budgeted.

The committee unanimously approved a motion De Lima made to have the DOE remove the restriction to the weighted student formula funds and present a revised plan at the committee’s October meeting.