How Texas schools grapple with budget deficits after Legislature punts major funding

The year will end in disappointment for many school administrators who watched a roller coaster of Texas legislative sessions end with lawmakers not passing an omnibus school funding package that districts had hoped would bolster their ailing budgets.

Increased pandemic operating costs, demands for higher pay and crippling inflation have left many districts pinching pennies. Without a serious influx of state money, many school administrators said they’ll have to make tough decisions about staff and programming next year.

Despite widespread calls from superintendents, teachers and parents for a boost in school funding, the billions in education spending many lawmakers proposed during the regular legislative session and subsequent special sessions became entangled in a heated debate about school choice, also known as education savings accounts or vouchers.

More: As districts, parents seek better education outcomes, Texas lawmakers weigh school choice

School choice proposals would use public money to pay for children’s private schooling, and Gov. Greg Abbott has invested significant political capital in fighting to get a school choice plan over the finish line. When lawmakers didn’t pass the program during the regular session in spring, Abbott called them back to Austin for two additional 30-day sessions this fall, after having called two special sessions over the summer to deliver property tax relief.

School choice has pitted Republican House members against one another and opened the floodgates to online personal attacks between Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who leads the Senate, and House Speaker Dade Phelan, the lower chamber's chief — both Republicans.

The Senate has passed school choice proposals, but the measures have languished in the House, where Democrats and some rural Republicans have rejected such plans over concerns the program would drain funds from traditional public school districts. School choice proponents say the program is needed to make other schooling options more accessible to parents who feel their children's academic needs aren't being met.

'Difficult decisions in terms of who to cut'

Lost in the legislative fights were billions in proposed school funding and teacher pay raises, which districts need to keep up with costs, said Hays school district Superintendent Eric Wright.

“They're holding hostage all of the funding that is vital to the backbone of the economy that is Texas — and that's public education,” Wright said.

Of 15 school districts in Central Texas, only five avoided adopting a deficit budget this year.

The true impact of those decisions haven’t really hit the districts yet, Wright said.

“If we don’t see any relief by this time next year, we’ll have to start prioritizing and making some pretty difficult decisions in terms of who to cut,” he said.

Districts are now playing a delicate balancing act, said Eanes district Superintendent Jeff Arnett.

The Eanes district needs to increase educators' pay to retain and recruit teachers, but it also has to keep costs down, he said. It wants to have small class sizes and offer a wide swath of programs, but that means more staff.

“We have to monitor and control the positions that we approve in the district,” Arnett said. “There may be cases where class sizes are a little larger than we would like them to be.”

The Round Rock district in November asked voters for a special tax rate to give teachers pay raises. The voter-approved measure dropped the tax rate, but kept it higher than it otherwise would have been to give the district an extra $19 million to boost educators' pay.

Round Rock school Superintendent Hafedh Azaiez said his district needed to appeal to its voters because it couldn’t afford to wait for the Legislature to act.

“We have to promise raises to staff,” Azaiez said. “People have to know if we're going to give them raises early. We cannot just wait until the last minute.”

'We have had to look for other options'

The Legislature did approve some additional funding for schools. During the regular session, lawmakers approved House Bill 3, a $330 million package that gave districts $15,000 per campus for security funding and required armed personnel at every school.

However, that funding simply isn’t enough, Manor school Superintendent Robert Sormani said. The requirements under the new law actually added $1.6 million in additional costs to the district, he said.

“These types of unfunded mandates, with no additional funding placed toward public schools, has resulted in us exploring extensive cost-saving measures at every level,” Sormani said. “Of course, we will not cut corners on safety, so we have had to look for other options.”

The district is delaying opening a new elementary school, largely due to budget reasons.

The state gives school districts $6,160 annually per student, plus additional money for programs such as bilingual and special education, which can add thousands more per child. That base level education funding hasn’t increased since 2019.

Increasing that base funding level by $500 would be a game changer, Azaiez said. It would add $20 million to the Round Rock district's $534.2 million budget, he said.

Lawmaker reaction

Several lawmakers expressed frustration after the Legislature's fourth special session this year ended Wednesday with no school funding proposal having advanced.

During the fourth session, Rep. Ken King, R-Canadian, pushed to pass a $205.1 million safety package. Though the proposal passed in the House, it died in the Senate.

“I think ultimately the Senate didn't want anything to pass funding-related if a voucher bill didn't get passed,” King said. “The governor was very clear it's all or nothing.”

Abbott has said he will not approve public education funding until lawmakers advance a proposal to make state money available to subsidize students' private schooling.

King said several school districts he represents are operating on a budget deficit, so it’s disappointing that the Legislature didn’t do more.

“I think we had an opportunity to make sure all kids have a safe learning environment, and we passed on it,” he said.

For Arnett, the Eanes superintendent, it’s unfortunate that education funding and school choice got tangled in the same bill.

“We would hope that those would be individually considered but not tied to each other or one being leveraged over another for what appear to be political purposes,” Arnett said.

After the House rejected multiple school choice proposals through the year, Abbott, a Republican, threatened to campaign against members of his party who voted against his signature issue. And he has wasted no time in making good on that promise.

Even before the fourth special session ended Wednesday, Abbott was announcing support for primary opponents to the 21 House Republicans who voted for an amendment Nov. 17 that stripped education savings accounts out of a $7.6 billion education bill.

The 84-63 vote delivered a fatal blow to House Bill 1, the omnibus education bill that included teacher pay raises.

In his endorsements for at least some of the GOP primary challengers, he specifically cited “education freedom” and “empowering parents” as reasons to back them.

Abbott has also said he would continue calling special legislative sessions until lawmakers pass a school choice bill. It's not yet clear if the governor will call a fifth special session or wait to see which candidates win in the primaries and wait to take up school choice when the Legislature reconvenes in 2025.

After the Nov. 17 vote in the House to strip education savings accounts from the $7.6 billion education funding bill, Abbott said: "I will continue advancing school choice in the Texas Legislature and at the ballot box, and will maintain the fight for parent empowerment until all parents can choose the best education path for their child. I am in it to win it."

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: With no education funding bill, Texas schools left with deficits