Without state funding, Denton ISD would have to raid its own budget for a one-time teacher pay raise

The bill would funnel $4.5 billion into Texas schools as well as put critical money into teacher pay. The bill would also help districts like Denton ISD by changing the state allotment from paying according to average daily student attendance to funding according to enrollment. Denton ISD is a rapid-growth district with about 33,000 students attending schools in 18 different municipalities.

Local voters are doing what they can. They just passed two of three bond propositions. The biggest proposition put millions toward building new schools and buildings in anticipation of surging enrollment.

But more and more, it looks like the bill might expire.

“Really the only bill that was carrying any additional funding for us this year has kind of stalled out so far,” said Jennifer Stewart, the district’s executive director of budget. “[DISD Superintendent] Dr. [Jamie] Wilson and I talked about it. We don’t know. We just look at each other like we don’t know.”

Wilson told board members that Texas public school leaders are getting bad news about the bill.

“We’re hearing that it’s not going to be heard,” Wilson said, eliciting sober looks from elected leaders and administrators on the dais. The recent election season highlighted a wealth of will on the local level to support and promote teachers, with a deep recognition of the reality that public school teachers are among the most credentialed people in the workforce.

Stewart said that because of the status of HB 100, the district’s budget office has to continue planning according to current law.

“That’s really our only choice,” Stewart said.

“The compensation increases and the things that our state elected officials were talking to us about for teachers and whatnot, we don’t know where that’s coming from or where that’s going to be,” Wilson said. “So we’ll do what we can and work through it. And if there are special sessions or something that comes up later this summer and into the fall, then we will have to make some decisions about how we handle that.

“You have enough revenue in your fund balance to take you a little ways,” Wilson added. “But you don’t have enough revenue in your fund balance to do that more than once.”

Should trustees approve a one-time compensation bump from the fund balance, Wilson said, they should brace for consequences soon after.

“And then if nothing comes along to increase the revenue, we’ll have to start looking at reduction in programs and personnel and other things through the ‘23-’24 school year as a result of no funding from our state,” Wilson said.

Place 5 Trustee Charles Stafford fumed, and compared the lack of action on the state legislation to “trying to bake a cake with no flour.”

“I’m pretty angry about this,” Stafford said. “They had a $37 billion surplus. We’re 13 days from the end of the session and they haven’t put one dime in for public schools. That is not putting public education where it belongs.”

Stafford looked into the gallery and threw up his hands.

“You guys ought to get mad, too,” he said. “This is not a way to plan and run a complex operation when your professionals are just scratching their heads.”

Wilson warned that inaction could lead to a scenario like that of 2011, when schools across the state shed personnel and programs.

“We had a ‘mayday’ press conference on May 1 with the local districts and talked about how pressing this was,” Wilson said. “And for there to be teacher retention and teacher recruitment issues, and for us to spend all our time on other items instead of this? It’s really not doing the 5.4 million students across the state of Texas any justice. We can talk all the politics we want. You can go red, blue do what you want. The bottom line is that the third grader in the classroom is the one that suffers.”