Two payments owed to Carbon Career and Technical Institute from one of its sending school districts for over a month arrived last week.

CCTI Business Administrator Jeff Deutsch said the school received payments from Lehighton Area School District for July and August on Thursday.

In an email last week, Lehighton business manager Patricia Denicola said July and August payments, totaling over $300,000, were not timely mailed after they were approved by the district’s school board.

“This was corrected before (last week’s) finance committee meeting when I discovered that the payments had not yet been mailed,” Denicola said.

Dave Reinbold, CCTI executive director, attended Lehighton’s finance committee meeting last week and said he had reached out several times to the district’s superintendent.

“My only purpose of going to the finance committee meeting on Monday was to inform the committee that payments were not received despite several communications with the administration,” Reinbold said. “I appreciate all that the entire Lehighton board and the finance committee does in support of CCTI.”

Each month, Lehighton is billed $157,000 from CCTI.

Deutsch said this scenario was the first time a sending district had owed the school, which serves Lehighton, Palmerton, Panther Valley, Jim Thorpe and Weatherly, two or three payments at one time.

District cash flow concerns, Denicola said, resulted in the slower payment of some bills until real estate tax money starts coming in strong again.

“We have to make sure we’re making our Pennsylvania State Employee Retirement System payments and meeting our payroll,” she said. “The subsidy cycle has started again, so that is going to help out.”

For the past three fiscal years, Denicola said, the district has paid CCTI invoices each month from July through March. March has been the final operating payment to CCTI for the fiscal year.

According to Reinbold, payments from sending districts are due on the fifth of each month. Lehighton’s September payment, however, was just approved Monday night and the October payment will be on the Oct. 28 board agenda for approval.

“This is consistent with how the district has paid CCTI in the past,” Denicola said.