For the first time in years, the Leon County School Board will be looking at an operating budget with a $17 million decrease despite gaining an additional $10 million in property tax revenue.
Superintendent Rocky Hanna says the 2024 expiration of federal dollars doled out to support districts during the COVID pandemic, and recently frozen federal money are to blame for the abnormally large gap.
“There’s usually not this big of a discrepancy from one year to the next,” Hanna said. He has deemed the district being in a financial crisis and has even hinted at possibly closing schools in the future if funding doesn’t increase.
Hanna said more information about how the staff managed to balance the budget despite a $12 million hole created by shortfalls in state and federal funding will be available after he has briefed the board on July 28. The budget shortfall has also become a moving target because the White House has unfrozen billions of grant money in recent days.
The Trump administration said Friday it will return the remaining more than $5 billion in funding that it previously withheld from public schools for nearly a month, easing many school administrators’ anxiety about federal funding hurdles for the 2025-2026 school year.
The federal government froze the money on June 30 to allow for the White House’s Office of Management and Budget to review nearly $7 billion allocated for schools.
The Leon County School Board will hold its first public hearing on the tentative budget at 6 p.m. July 29 in the Aquillina Howell Center.
During the last two years, the budget has held steady at about $666 million, but the 2025-2026 spending plan is projected to drop to $649 million. The superintendent is recommending the school board decrease its current property tax rate of 5.384 to 5.366, or about $402 for every $100,000 of property value. That would still be considered a tax increase due to rising property values and generate about $156 million.
The school district will receive $215 million from the state, $19.4 million from the federal government and $201 million from local tax collections.
Last year, the district received $76 million in federal funding.
Hanna announced in early July that the district would see an additional $6.6 million in its allocation from the state with $6.4 million of the surplus dedicated to private school scholarships, leaving $237,777 of the total increase on the table for the district.
Contract increases underway from the Leon County Sheriff’s Office, the Department of Health, Leon Classroom Teacher Association, and health insurance total up to $6.1 million. That amount added to dollars allocated to private school vouchers; the district is facing a loss of about $12.5 million.
“We’re doing the best we can to manage and to keep people employed this year. We had to reassign some folks because of the freeze on the federal grants but we haven’t had to release anyone,” Hanna said of the upcoming budget plan.
The federal government froze over $6 billion in grants for public schools to support teacher development, students from low-income families, afterschool programs with the 21st Century grant and more, leaving public school districts in limbo.
Hanna asked his colleagues at the Children’s Services Council on July 17 in partnership with the Boys and Girls Club of the Big Bend for $2.1 million to offer afterschool programs. The following day, about $1 billion in grant money was released from the federal government to school districts across the nation to proceed offering 21st Century programs.
The $2.1 million in emergency funding was going to the Boys & Girls Club of the Big Bend to be disbursed in quarterly payments based on services provided in the afterschool programs.
Hanna said the district received $2 million for the 21st Century grant and will be able to operate as normal beginning Aug. 11 with afterschool care meaning they won’t need the emergency CSC money for it. But it still leaves almost $4 million frozen which he says the district is managing.
While the district is formalizing the upcoming 2025-26 budget, Hanna said the future is even more bleak as he is preparing to make tough decisions ahead of the 2026-27 budget next year.
“Everything is on the table,” Hanna said of the 2026-27 fiscal year. “We’re evaluating schools, staff at schools and staff at the district office and just trying to find ways to cut costs.”
(This story was updated because an earlier version included an inaccuracy.)
Alaijah Brown covers children & families for the Tallahassee Democrat. She can be reached at ABrown1@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter/X: @AlaijahBrown3.
This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Leon County Schools’ budget could drop by $17M despite tax increase. Here’s why
Reporting by Alaijah Brown, Tallahassee Democrat / Tallahassee Democrat
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