Desert Sands reviews draft LCAP and budget outlook as enrollment remains below pre-pandemic levels

The Desert Sands Unified School District Board of Education on June 10 reviewed a draft Local Control and Accountability Plan and a budget overview that ties district spending to academic, college-and-career and social-emotional goals.

Gabriela Yamas, the district’s LCAP coordinator, told trustees the draft “tells the story of how Desert Sands is working to improve outcomes for all students with a specific focus on our English learners, low income and students in foster care.” The plan frames actions around three core goals — academic growth and early literacy; college- and career-readiness; and social-emotional learning and mental-health supports — and incorporates state equity multiplier goals for several high-need schools.

Assistant Superintendent of Business Services Jordan Aquino reviewed the fiscal context. He said the district’s Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) receipts total about $341,000,000, with roughly $82.5 million identified as supplemental/concentration funding tied to unduplicated pupil counts. Aquino emphasized that personnel costs dominate the general fund: salaries and benefits account for roughly 82.5% of total expenditures, and 89% of restricted-program dollars also go to personnel.

Aquino warned that declining enrollment has reduced revenues despite periodic high COLA years. He summarized the district’s recent enrollment and revenue picture: from 2018‑19 through 2024‑25 the district lost about 10.6% of enrollment; the district saw a net drop of roughly 381 students in one year and 184 the following year, per the presentation. In the adopted/proposed budget materials, the district plans to use fund balance in the near term while monitoring state budget developments; the projected combined general‑fund reserve is approximately 36% for 2025‑26, compared with a statewide average for unified districts of about 24.36%.

Aquino explained recurring upward cost pressures: negotiated salary step-and-column movements, pension costs and higher utilities tied to lowered thermostat set points. He said the budget models include projected COLA assumptions from the state May Revision (about 2.3% in the near term in the governor’s May revision) and that small enrollment shifts materially affect revenues (each student is worth an estimated amount in the tens of thousands in LCFF dollars).

Board members asked clarifying questions about enrollment projections, solar installations at some sites, and revenue sources including lottery dollars and Prop 98 funding. Aquino said staff uses live-births by ZIP code, normal grade-level migration and developer activity to project future enrollment but will not assume growth until it materializes year over year.

The board opened and closed public hearings on the LCAP and the budget; no final LCAP adoption vote was recorded at the June 10 meeting. Several business-service agenda items (18.1 and 18.2 among others) were approved by roll call earlier in the meeting, each carried 5–0. Trustees were reminded that the full LCAP document — a multi-tabbed binder and a one-page infographic — was provided to the board for review and that a formal vote on the LCAP is scheduled for a subsequent meeting.

Trustees and staff said they will continue to refine the plan and track state budget developments before final adoption.