INDY Week by Chloe Courtney Bohl

At last night’s Wake County school board meeting, district superintendent Robert Taylor presented a $2.28 billion draft operating budget for the 2025-2026 school year. Taylor’s proposed budget covers the opening of four new schools and maintains existing programs, but does not include money for any new programs and requires $19 million in budget cuts district-wide.

“Tonight, you will hear about tough choices due to limited resources,” Taylor told reporters ahead of the meeting. “But know and understand that student success remains at the heart of everything.”

According to Taylor and Wake County Public School System (WCPSS) chief business officer David Neter, the cuts are necessary because of insufficient funding for education at the state level, rising operating costs due to inflation, and a state law that requires the school system to transfer a portion of its funding to charter schools.

The WCPSS budget draws from federal, state, and county funding sources. In drafting his proposal, Taylor calculated that the school system needs about $60 million more in county-level funding compared to last year in order to open the four new schools, among other expenses. However, based on Wake County revenue projections for next year, Taylor proposed that the school system request only a $40 million appropriation increase from the county. To bridge the approximately $19 million gap, Taylor recommended a series of budget cuts, which he called “strategic repurposing.”

The cuts include the elimination of several administrative, nurse, and digital learning coordinator positions (some of which were already vacant) and reduced funding for school supplies. A detailed breakdown is available here.

Neter told the school board Tuesday night that the proposed cuts represent the least of all evils and disproportionately impact WCPSS’s central office rather than its schools. According to Neter, the budget proposal was developed painstakingly over multiple months.

“Gnashing of teeth comes to mind, working through what we felt would be the least painful and least impactful repurposing,” he said. “It was not easy. There were some heated yet professional moments.”

During the public comment period of the meeting, the president of the Wake chapter of the North Carolina Association of Educators, Christina Cole, argued against Taylor’s recommendation that WCPSS only request $40 million from Wake County.

“Despite federal implications and budget shortfalls, I hope district leadership and this school board will at least ask for what we need,” Cole said, “then let the [Wake County] commission decide what they will or won’t do.”

Spread across Wake County’s more than 160,000 public school students, Taylor’s proposed budget translates to $13,460 in spending per student.

In the 2021-2022 school year—the most recent year for which data is available from the U.S. Department of Education—per-pupil spending averaged $15,921 nationwide and $12,120 in North Carolina. 

Wake County Schools’ current 2024-2025 operating budget totals $2.23 billion dollars. Ten percent of that money ($218 million) comes from the federal government, 53 percent ($1.18 billion) from the state government, 32 percent ($703 million) from Wake County, and 5 percent from other local sources.

Taylor’s proposed budget for next year is broken down similarly. The superintendent estimates a slightly lower federal contribution of 8 percent, or $178 million, next year.

Uncertainty about ongoing federal funding is a wild card in the budget proposal, Neter acknowledged. WCPSS already lost one federal grant worth $11.78 million last month as part of the Trump administration’s targeting of diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives.

“Further federal reductions could have a material impact on our student services,” Neter said. “Very little is known.” 

Ahead of the school board meeting, board chair Chris Heagarty and Congresswoman Deborah Ross toured Hodge Road Magnet Elementary school, a Spanish language immersion school in Knightdale, to spotlight the potential risks of losing federal funding for education in Wake County. Hodge Road receives federal money through Title I and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).

Ross roamed the school’s muraled hallways and met with school and district leaders, parents, and students. 

“We cannot leave these kids behind,” she said. “We have laws to protect these kids, and the U.S. Department of Education cannot, without the consent of Congress, just decide to leave these kids behind. So we went to classrooms and saw kids who have disabilities, saw kids who don’t have English as their first language, saw what kind of amazing services and care that they’re getting in this school.”

Ross rebuked the Trump administration and the Republican-dominated state legislature’s approach to funding education. 

“The legislature has just decided to give a whole bunch of public school money for private school vouchers that can now go to affluent families,” she said. “So I don’t necessarily want to take federal money that goes directly to schools and give it to our North Carolina General Assembly. I don’t trust them.”

The Wake County school board has until May 15 to edit the superintendent’s proposed budget before they submit it to the county board of commissioners for consideration. The board will host several community meetings before then to solicit feedback on the draft. The meeting schedule is available here.

Link to full article: https://indyweek.com/news/wake/wake-county-public-schools-budget-draft-includes-19-million-in-spending-cuts/