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Tigard‑Tualatin board authorizes reduction in force amid multi‑million dollar shortfall
Summary
The Tigard‑Tualatin School District board voted 5‑0 to allow administration to implement layoffs and other budget reductions after trustees were told the district faces an estimated $10.7 million to $12 million shortfall over the next two years and has drawn down reserves.
The Tigard‑Tualatin School District Board of Directors voted unanimously to authorize administration to begin a reduction‑in‑force process for administrative, licensed and classified staff for the 2025–26 school year.
Superintendent Udo Senada told the board the district has seen declining enrollment, rising operational costs and insufficient state school funding that left expenditures outpacing revenues. “We spent down our reserves by almost $20,000,000 since 2020–21,” Senada said while describing the scale of the shortfall.
Board members and district staff described a multi‑step plan that blends staff reductions with cuts to discretionary spending and contract adjustments. District presentation materials and the superintendent’s remarks said the district needs to achieve roughly $10.7 million to $12 million in reductions across the biennium and identified about $9.1 million in potential staffing savings drawn from licensed and classified positions and a small number of administrative changes.
District leaders said licensed staffing reductions mainly reflect “rightsizing” class‑staffing ratios to current enrollment rather than programmatic changes; some non‑classroom instructional supports funded temporarily by federal ESSER grants earlier in the pandemic will be scaled back as those funding sources end. Classified‑staff reductions were described as programmatic adjustments that include some backfilling between areas, yielding a net change smaller than the gross number of positions affected. The package presented also included a 15% reduction to discretionary school and program budgets and targeted reductions in support contracts and services to reach the stated target.
The board and administration emphasized timelines and contractual requirements. The district said it needs at least 60 calendar days for licensed staff notification and 30 days for classified staff notification to meet collective‑bargaining and statutory timelines; board approval of the authorization gives the district the time buffer to complete the process before June. The superintendent said the district will follow contractual recall procedures and plans to pursue recalls if and when funding or enrollment change.
Board discussion acknowledged the difficulty of the decision. Director Kristen Miles called the process “emotionally hard” and urged fellow trustees to proceed with transparency. Director Zerschmid and others noted the work is meant to stabilize the district’s finances and return it to a sustainable trajectory. Several trustees also cautioned that remaining staff will need clear direction about priorities after reductions.
The motion to authorize district administration to conduct the reduction in force passed by voice vote; the board recorded the motion as carried with an affirmative vote and no recorded opposition.
