Durham Public Schools is $7 million over budget, the superintendent announced last night in a news release. The shortfall comes on the heels of a historic $27.4 million funding increase that was approved in June.
The district, whose total budget for the 2024-2025 school year is just over $691 million, cited unbudgeted expenses as the source of the deficit. More specifically, the budget team found mistakes related to staffing, charter schools, child nutrition, master’s pay, and utilities. Also, some $875,000 in costs were left out of the budget altogether, including bus driver attendance bonuses.
The announcement comes shortly after new Superintendent Anthony Lewis, who came on board on Aug. 12, celebrated his 100th day with DPS on January 15. To mark the milestone, Lewis will release a “Post-Entry Plan” in which the budget shortfall is a “key component,” according to the district’s news release.
“Our most pressing challenge is ensuring the financial stability of the district,” Lewis said in the release. “In the critical interest of accountability, transparency, and rebuilding trust in this district, I am committed to an honest accounting and reporting of our budget with regular opportunities for public input and clear explanation from our team.”
New Chief Financial Officer Jeremy Teetor, who joined the school system Nov. 4, spent the past two months going through the DPS budget with his team, according to the release. Teetor will provide regular budget updates to the board starting tomorrow night.
In a Powerpoint presentation released ahead of tomorrow’s meeting, Teetor lays out nine areas that created the deficit.
The priciest overages include:
- $18.6 million for 315 unaccounted-for staff positions
- $9.7 million due to under-budgeting for charter schools
- $3 million to cover child nutrition program losses
- $1.3 million due to under-estimating the number of teachers who qualify for master’s pay
The total budget shortfall would have been close to $35 million if not for steps taken by the district at the beginning of the school year. According to the news release, “DPS withheld 15% of every school and departmental budget, totaling $26.4 million” and has identified $1.1 million in state funding, bringing the shortfall total to just shy of $7 million.
Staff pay, one of the budget challenges, has been an ongoing point of contention for the district.
This time last year, DPS found itself in similar accounting trouble when the district rescinded promised raises for classified staff, kicking off months of turmoil. The payroll snafu led to protests led by the Durham Association of Educators, missed school days, and administration turnover. Paul LeSieur, DPS’s long-time chief financial officer, and Pascal Mubenga, the district’s superintendent of seven years, both resigned in the wake of the controversy .
The budget and staffing trouble carried over into the fall.
In September, the district posted pay schedules on its website that included mistakes for speech and language pathologists, school psychologists, and audiologists. The new schedules additionally did not correctly identify all staff who qualified for master’s pay, and the board directed administration to look into the correct estimate.
DPS is also in a transportation crisis, which has frenzied parents since August, due to a lack of bus drivers. The district has tried different solutions to get kids to school, such as providing only four days a week of bus service through December and early January.
The newly uncovered shortfall includes $145,000 for bus driver attendance bonuses, which was omitted from the budget.
Child nutrition has likewise been top-of-mind as the district kicked off a new nutrition program this year, focused on locally sourced, minimally processed food. Further, DPS started providing free breakfast and lunch to all children this year — regardless of family income — through a federal program. The district now says that due to “a new food sourcing/preparation process,” it will need $3 million to cover child nutrition-related shortfalls.
Lewis will be hosting a series of sessions dubbed “Dollars and Decisions: Understanding and Navigating the Durham Public Schools Budget,” to walk through the district’s budget development and spending decisions.
Above: Durham Public Schools Superintendent Anthony Lewis, speaking this fall at a groundbreaking ceremony for the new Durham School of the Arts. Photo by Abigail Bromberger — The 9th Street Journal
Correction: An earlier version of this article misstated previous superintendent’s first name. The error has been corrected.
Lily Kempczinski