BUFFALO, N.Y. (WKBW) — With the beginning of the school year just weeks away, leaders within the Buffalo Public School District are looking ahead regarding their future financial situation.
The district is required to provide an updated four-year plan each fiscal year.
The administration said funding issues facing the district are among the "most consequential in decades."
The numbers project a nearly $200 million shortfall between the upcoming school year through the 2027-2028 academic year.
Superintendent Dr. Tonja Williams plans to close the deficit through three key areas: student enrollment, staff reductions and school closures.
I headed to Wednesday night's school board meeting to learn more about these plans and what these changes could mean for the district's financial future.
"Remember what a four-year plan is. It incorporates, with solid financial analysis and trend data, solutions and potential outcomes for things that this board has talked about and seen for over a year," BPS Chief Financial Officer Jim Barnes said.
As part of the plan, the district made assumptions on major decisions based on analysis.
Some of those assumptions include:
- The district projects it will lose 200 students a year over the next four years
- The second year of the plan calls for a reduction of 250 staff. The district's proposed strategy to accomplish that involves selective hiring and position cuts of an expected 300 retirements and cutting additional teacher on special assignment positions.
- The district is planning for the closures/consolidations of two schools during the 2025-2026 year.
District Parent Coordinating Council President Edward Speidel said potentially closing two schools is overdue.
"Closing the two schools will help because they won't have teachers in smaller classes. They'll bring them over to the other buildings," Speidel said.
He said that having another set of layoffs is not ideal.
"As long as they continue to provide art, music, the aids that we need and all that, we'll be okay with that. If they try to lay off 100 teachers at once or something, it's not going to be pretty. I don't think it's healthy for our district to go through what we went through this year, and then next year lay off another 100 people," Speidel said.
The district did not elaborate on these projections.
Speidel hopes that information is shared sooner rather than later.
