Budget cuts are coming to Austin’s public schools next year, but will they impact students? Austin ISD Superintendent Matias Segura said his team is working to keep that from happening.
“There’s been a commitment from this administration from the very beginning to limit impacts to the classroom,” Segura said of the ongoing budget process. “We’ve said that, we’ll continue to say that, we’ll continue to be committed to that.”
Segura’s promise came at an April 4 meeting of the board of trustees, as he and Chief Financial Officer Eduardo Ramos presented the district’s plan to halve a $60 million shortfall in the Fiscal Year 2025 budget. The administrators propose cutting the deficit by $30 million and carrying the remaining $30 million into the following school year. Ramos said the district can sustain that deficit amount without an effect on its financial rating: “$30 million doesn’t get us to a balanced budget, but it gets us to a manageable budget.” The board of trustees will likely vote on a finalized budget in June.
Ramos said teacher and staff positions are not being eliminated. He explained that AISD will spend about $956 million next year; of that figure, $581 million will be spent on school campuses for teachers, staff, and student services. The other $375 million will be spent on non-campus expenses, and this is where the $30 million in cuts will come from.
The district proposes to save $26 million by cutting operations in the district’s warehouses, transportation, and the technology center, and by limiting overtime and trimming contracts. The remaining $4 million will come from the district’s Central Office; 42 positions, some of them already vacant, will be cut in the Talent Strategy, Finance, and Technology divisions, among others.
“The state is not going to fund our schools. They’re not going to adjust recapture, they’re not going to do anything with the basic allotment. That means we’ve got to take care of our schools. We have to do it right here. Everything we can do, we’ve got to do.” – Education Austin President Ken Zarifis
Segura said deciding where the cuts will be made has been difficult. He and Ramos pointed out that cuts would not be necessary if state Republicans (who they referred to as “the Legislature”) had not refused to increase school funding. With the state sitting on a large budget surplus, schools across the state were counting on such an increase. The funding never materialized as Gov. Greg Abbott demanded the Legislature approve his school voucher plan first. Legislators refused.
While Segura and Ramos emphasized that the cuts will spare students and teachers, they said the same would probably not be true if another $30 million has to be cut in the next budget cycle. And they floated a solution: asking for a tax rate election, to allow voters to vote on whether to raise the rate at which property owners are taxed. At the current rate, owners of a median-value house pay roughly $3,000 in taxes to Austin ISD each year.
State law allows school districts some flexibility in the rates at which they assess taxes. AISD’s current rate is the lowest in Central Texas because the district has gone more than a decade without raising it. Now, with voter approval, the district could maximize the rate. That would provide approximately $44 million extra for the FY 2025-26 budget, Ramos calculated. He added that most large school districts in the state have already maxed out their tax rates because of state Republicans’ refusal to increase funding.
To get the rate increase on the November ballot, the district would have to submit the proposal by August. The trustees said they support doing so. After Ramos concluded his presentation, Board President Arati Singh asked the trustees for their thoughts on a rate increase. None raised any objection. Lynn Boswell said she was “a strong yes.” Kathryn Whitley Chu said she believed the public will approve the increase: “We just have so much support in our community, and I think we have to do what they want and support our public schools.”
Ken Zarifis, the leader of Education Austin, the union representing the district’s teachers and staff, agreed that a tax rate increase is necessary. He praised the district for keeping its options open by not having raised the rate already.
“It was a pretty responsible effort on the district’s part,” Zarifis said, “but I think it’s time that we go after [the rate increase]. It’s important that we do. The state is not going to fund our schools. They’re not going to adjust recapture, they’re not going to do anything with the basic allotment. That means we’ve got to take care of our schools. We have to do it right here. Everything we can do, we’ve got to do.”
This article appears in April 26 • 2024.
