Kenosha Unified seeks $23 million-a-year, five-year referendum to plug budget shortfall and fund safety upgrades

Kenosha Unified Superintendent Jeff Weiss told residents at a town hall that the district will ask voters on Feb. 18 whether to allow the district to exceed its state revenue limit by $23,000,000 per year for five years to cover operating costs and debt service for safety improvements.

The referendum question, Weiss said, is a nonrecurring five‑year measure that would “beginning with the 2025–26 school year and ending with the 2029–30 school year” and would provide $23 million each year; after five years the authorization would expire unless voters approve another question.

Weiss said the district faces a structural funding gap caused by state revenue limits that have not kept pace with inflation and by the end of the ESSER federal aid that many districts used for ongoing costs. He said KUSD closed schools and reduced staff in the most recent “rightsizing” process, which saved about $10 million annually but that the district still faces a projected $19 million deficit for 2025–26. “Had state funding kept pace with inflation, KUSD would have had an additional $31,000,000 available in its budget and an operational referendum would not be necessary,” Weiss said.

Why it matters: Weiss and district leaders framed the question as a choice between asking local voters for temporary additional revenue and making deeper cuts to staff, programs and maintenance. The presentation listed likely consequences if the referendum fails: larger class sizes, reduced student programming, postponed maintenance and other reductions the district said would impair educational services.

Scope and uses: The district’s public materials and Weiss’s presentation break the $23 million request into several pieces: the district estimates roughly $3,000,000 per year for security upgrades (including controlled entrances at seven schools), amounts to return some costs that had been covered with ESSER grant money back into the operational budget, and inflationary increases for transportation, insurance and other ongoing operations. Weiss said the district projects about $3.5 million of additional revenue for 2025–26 but about $26 million in additional expenses, yielding the $23 million referendum figure.

ESSER, enrollment and staffing: District officials told attendees the end of ESSER (federal COVID relief) funding created a fiscal cliff. Weiss said KUSD received about $72,000,000 in ESSER and related grants across multiple rounds; he described rough category totals the district reported to the public: about $22,600,000 for personnel (for example, additional counselors and building substitutes during COVID), about $11,000,000 for construction and purchase services mainly tied to HVAC and building systems, roughly $11,000,000 for noncapital technology items (Chromebooks, interactive boards, hotspots) and about $4,700,000 in allowable indirect costs. Weiss said those one‑time funds largely ended in September 2024.

Weiss and other administrators also pointed to a drop in student enrollment that worsens the revenue shortfall. The superintendent said student enrollment has declined roughly 11.5 percent (attributed mainly to lower birth rates and some open enrollment/home school movement). He said the district eliminated “about 200 full‑time positions” in the rightsizing process to balance the 2024–25 budget.

Tax impact and mechanics: Weiss described how levies work: the school board adopts a fixed tax levy and that levy is spread across the total taxable property value in the district’s municipalities (the city of Kenosha, village and town of Somers, and Pleasant Prairie). As an example, Weiss said the school board’s most recent levy was about $81,400,000 and that the city of Kenosha accounts for roughly 59% of the district’s taxable base (about $15.9 billion in taxable property in the city, per Weiss).

Other budget drivers discussed: the Wisconsin Parental Choice Program (vouchers) was raised by residents. Weiss said the district’s tax levy includes passthroughs tied to vouchers and that, he said, the community effectively bore about $6.7 million in levy costs last year that the district must forward to private schools under state policy. District leaders also referenced Act 20 (state reading requirements and the Science of Reading initiatives) as a state‑level mandate requiring implementation supports and professional time, which the district said will require funding beyond current allocations.

Facility disposition: In response to a question about closed school buildings, Weiss said the school board recently approved a comprehensive arrangement with the city of Kenosha for marketing, remediation and demolition costs on shuttered properties. Per the presentation, the city will cover upfront remediation and demolition costs, rezone and market sites, and the district and city will split profits 50–50 after the city recoups its costs; district staff said the Hillcrest site is likely the most marketable and could produce some proceeds, but most sites are not expected to yield significant profit.

Questions and answers: The town hall included an extended public Q&A. Residents asked about teacher compensation and professional planning time, tax impacts for new construction and businesses, details of ESSER spending, forensic audits (the district said annual external audits are posted publicly), voucher impacts, possible reductions in school days, and high school performance goals tied to the district’s three‑year improvement plan. Weiss and district chiefs provided specific program and budget explanations during the Q&A and referred attendees to district materials and an online tax‑impact estimator (kusd.edu/referendum) for property‑specific impacts.

What’s not a decision here: The town hall was informational. No ballot result was decided at the meeting and no formal board vote on the referendum was taken during the session; the district’s board had earlier approved pursuing a nonrecurring five‑year referendum and a separate board action approving the city partnership on closed properties was referenced as having already occurred.

Ending: The district encouraged attendees to submit remaining questions via a QR code or the district website; Weiss closed by thanking participants and reminding voters the referendum question will appear on the Feb. 18 ballot.