Hamilton County Schools officials attribute the up-to-$18 million deficit the district is facing to two main factors — lower than expected local revenues and rising costs.
The budget shortfall is expected to lead to significant cuts to some district programs, such as magnet school busing and substitute nurses. Students, teachers and community members packed the school board meeting room beyond capacity Thursday to voice their support for programs and positions that could be cut.
As the school system builds its budget, district officials work with Hamilton County to estimate the growth in local property and sales taxes, said Shannon Moody, the district’s chief strategy officer. The district then budgets based on the local revenue projection the county provides.
For the 2023-24 school year, the district’s budget projected that it would receive more from local taxes than it actually received, Moody said. The following year, the budget was based on projected growth over the overly optimistic revenue projections approved in the 2023-24 budget.
The actual revenue numbers were delayed by a couple months. By the time the district knew that local revenue did not come in as expected for the 2023-24 budget, the Hamilton County school board had already passed the 2024-25 budget, Moody said.