By Gabriella Beker
Austin ISD’s $1.73 billion budget for 2021-22 includes some increases for critical areas, such as $137 million for special education and $1.5 million for additional transportation routes, as well as funds to help the district address mental health and academic needs following the pandemic.
Interim Chief Financial Officer George Gogonas shared the recommended budget with AISD trustees at their May 13 meeting.
“We’re not waiting to ensure that we’re going to provide assistance with literacy, and with helping students get caught up, or with dealing with some of the mental health issues that would be affecting everybody at this time frame,” Superintendent Stephanie S. Elizalde said.
The recommended budget includes a $39.2 million deficit for the general fund, and an estimated expenditure of $709 million in recapture that will be paid to the state, based on a projected 7.9% increase in property tax values.
While the $39 million deficit is comparable to past years, during which deficits have been offset with reserve funds, Gogonas cautioned against the long-term use of such funds.
“We have adopted a deficit budget for four consecutive years, so unfortunately this is not a new trend,” he said. “Using fund balance reserves to cover ongoing costs is simply an unsustainable practice, and it puts additional pressures on the fund balance throughout the school year and fiscal year for unexpected costs that arise.”
ESSER funding
Included in those unexpected costs were more than $50 million in COVID-related expenditures such as technology and PPE.
Austin ISD is eligible for $155 million in one-time federal funding to address needs caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. These funds can be used in five categories—supporting teachers, acquiring instructional materials, providing more instructional time, empowering parents, and offering facility or technology support.
“The general fund budget will likely be amended next school year, or next fiscal year, as we reimburse ourselves for some of our already incurred pandemic expenses, and offset some of our anticipated costs with these funds to build back up our fund balance and continue to support students beyond just the allowable dates of this funding,” Gogonas said.
As a part of the process for receiving the funds, the district will begin engaging with families, students, staff and other stakeholders in late May to identify the most meaningful ways to use the money to address student needs that arose after the 2020–21 school year.
Elizalde emphasized the importance of a transparent engagement process for the use of the funds, in which “we don’t let people go astray by not giving them the guardrails and the parameters as they engage in the process, so we don’t continue to add to the mistrust that we currently have.”
Realigning central administration funds
High on Elizalde’s list of priorities for the budget is realigning Central Office funding to better serve campuses.
Staffing and non-staffing costs at the district’s Central Office make up less than 2% of total expenditures in the 2021–22 budget. A $6.9 million cut allows for “a reallocation of existing dollars into a higher priority area that would actually benefit students,” she said.
She said that repurposing unspent central administration funds and centralizing certain campus supports will “let [campuses] do the job of educating our children… not to continue to burden individual campuses as if this is their individual responsibility.”
“This is another plan for how we support each other in this work,” Elizalde said . “One successful school does not a successful district make. We need all schools to be successful.”