San Benito passes $133.4M budget; planning to boost student numbers

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School district officials are planning to boost student numbers to help offset state funding cuts under a new $133.4 million budget coming with employee raises and full health insurance coverage.

The tight budget forcing cost cuts is based on a property tax rate of about $1 per $100 valuation.

In September, the school board is expected to set a new tax rate.

Now, officials are planning to boost student numbers from 7,963 to 8,942, projecting an increase of about $6 million in revenue.

On Thursday, board President Orlando Lopez described the budget as the toughest to draft in years.

“It’s very difficult right now,” he said.

Amid state funding cuts, he said, the past school board trimmed about 1 cent off the district’s tax rate about three years ago, leading to the loss of about $400,000 in revenue.

“That’s a factor,” Lopez said in an interview. “We could have used that $400,000 for our kids. It could have gone to pay raises for our staff.”

During the last few years, the district’s student average daily attendance rate dropped from about 98% to about 92%, Acting Superintendent Fred Perez said.

As part of the district’s plan to boost student numbers, officials are partnering with day care centers to enroll students while launching an optional flexible school day schedule.

“We’re trying things like adding our Pre-K 3 students, we’re trying something with optional flexible school day,” Perez told board members during Tuesday’s public hearing into the budget

In planning the budget, officials cut costs to help balance the budget.

“I met with the directors and all of them had concerns, just like the principals had concerns because their budget is being cut,” Monica Mata, the district’s chief financial officer, told board members earlier this month.

Lopez questioned whether cuts could impact students’ extracurricular activities such as athletics.

“This is for all extracurricular activities,” he said earlier this month. “I think the common question’s going to be, how is it affecting our student athletes, our students that participate? Is it less trips, less games with reducing of these funds? I think it’s a conversation we probably need to have with our directors and find out exactly how it’s affecting our extracurricular activities as a whole.”

After months of planning, board members Tuesday passed the $133.4 million budget coming with a fund balance of $14 million.

Under the budget, local revenue is projected to bring in $18.4 million while state funding’s set at $88.2 million, with $10.9 million made up of federal revenue.

As part of the budget, officials are earmarking $60.9 million, or about 46%, to fund the district’s instructional program.

In the district’s food service department, officials are projecting $9.6 million in revenue while pulling $2.1 million from the general fund to help cover a total of $11.8 million in salaries.

Under the budget, officials are boosting starting teachers’ salaries to $53,000.

During a meeting, board members stressed the focus of boosting student daily attendance, a key factor determining state funding.

“It’s very clear cut here,” Lopez said after the public hearing. “State funding is decreasing. That’s not a secret.”

Lopez credited staff with working on plans aimed at boosting student numbers.

“By identifying some factors that will help us increase our revenue with ADA (average daily attendance) and so on, you guys have really gone into looking into that and I applaud you guys, because this is a very difficult task, especially with ESSER funds eliminated,” he said, referring to federal Elementary and Secondary Emergency Relief funds, set to expire in September after being issued to help school districts amid the coronavirus pandemic’s economic slowdown.

Meanwhile, the district faces cuts in state funding after state lawmakers passed the biggest tax cut in Texas history last year.

“I think we, as a board, understand that finances moving forward are going to be a little scarce, a little tight, but you guys are going to do everything you can to make sure we continue to provide our students with the best quality of education and experience, taking care of our staff with raises and so on,” Lopez said.

“But again, I think everybody understands that there are some trying times coming and there’s a lot of work to be done,” he said. “You know, we have got to focus on ADA — increasing ADA so we can forecast and continue to increase the revenue so that we won’t have to go through this situation. The board will continue to do everything that we can to be creative and find new avenues of revenue for our district.”

Across Texas, school districts are slashing costs amid state funding cuts, board Vice President Ariel Cruz-Vela said.

“Unfortunately, this budget issue is something that’s been going on throughout the entire state,” she said. “It seems like every school district is suffering the same results — the lack of state funding.”

Since the pandemic, some parents have been keeping their children away from school.

“I want to be very clear to our community and to our district that ADA is the number-one thing that funds us and we need to make sure that we are increasing attendance all across the district,” Cruz-Vela said. “I know there are plans in place for the school year in order to increase that ADA. Five kids per six weeks at each campus can increase by more than a half a million dollars.”

Officials are planning to work with parents to bring their children back into the classrooms.

“This is happening across the state,” Perez said, referring to enrollment drops. “ADA is an issue after COVID, where 98% attendance rates were very common, even in this district, to where now 92% attendance rates are what we’re hitting. If we can just raise that by three or four percentage points, that will increase our funding drastically.”

As part the district’s new strategic plan, officials are planning to focus on boosting student numbers, Perez said.

“One of the basises of our strategic plan is going to have to be getting everybody involved in increasing our attendance, not just increasing student population,” he said. “If we do it right, we can bring in more money. That’s our plan.”