Operations leaders flag staffing shortfalls, rising contract and utility costs in FY26 request

Cornell Brown, chief operating officer for the Howard County Public School System, told the Board of Education on Jan. 23 that the division of operations is presenting a “same services” FY26 budget that includes targeted increases in contract and utility costs while holding most staffing levels steady.

Brown outlined five primary change buckets in the operations request: increased transportation contract costs, route and walk-zone adjustments, lease cost increases for facilities, reclassification of preventive maintenance staff and higher utility and trash costs. He said the division is not seeking broad new staffing beyond a handful of grant- or program-driven additions but listed a number of unfunded priorities — notably custodial and maintenance positions, technology and routing-software upgrades, equipment maintenance and supplies whose market prices have risen sharply.

Key numbers and items presented - Transportation contract services: $5,300,000 requested to address higher contract costs driven largely by demand for special-needs routes and program growth. - Walk-zone/routing adjustments: $1,200,000 to support route changes tied to policy 52100 and service expansions (the presentation referenced adding about 11 buses tied to walk-zone changes). - Lease adjustments: $81,200 requested to cover higher lease costs for logistics and training facilities. - Utility cost increase: the division cited a projected $1,600,000 increase tied to electricity and other utility price changes; the budget book pages cited a larger net reallocation among program accounts to align utilities with location-based reporting. - Trash and recycling: $210,000 request based on new bids following expiration of a countywide contract. - Preventive maintenance reclassifications: roughly $230,000 to adjust pay grades of preventive maintenance mechanics doing comparable work at different grades.

Staffing, vacancies and custodial concerns Brown said the division currently manages roughly 79 buildings and three offices and roughly 845 staff across operations. He and operations staff noted prior staffing reductions in maintenance and custodial roles and said the district currently operates with fewer maintenance and grounds staff than in prior years even as square footage of facilities has grown. Brown said custodial vacancies and daily absenteeism (he cited an average of about 18% daily absences in custodial ranks) increase strain on the remaining workforce.

Board members pressed operations leaders for more granular data. Board Member Miss McCoy asked whether the district now has enough grounds staff for snow events; Brown said the division will provide detailed benchmarks comparing custodial and grounds staffing levels to industry norms (most districts Brown referenced staff at roughly 20,000 square feet per custodian). Brown said the division will present math to show how current staffing translates into area-per-custodian and how many additional hires would be required to reach best-practice levels.

Routing software and fleet Director of Student Transportation Jahan Tafsiddiqui (transcript: Jahan Tafsadecki) told the board the current routing software is a legacy system that the vendor may no longer support; IT and transportation staff estimated a one-time $500,000 upgrade cost for new routing software and said a modern system should generate routing efficiencies over time. Tafsiddiqui said the transportation office is also short on financial-accounting capacity and requested additional fiscal support to manage roughly $60 million in contracts, hundreds of vehicles and dozens of vendors.

Unfunded priorities and next steps Brown provided a list of items that did not make the FY26 operating request but that the division considers priorities: restoration of some custodial positions (the division noted 34 positions lost in maintenance and operations over time), equipment maintenance (e.g., G-max turf testing), fleet-technology upgrades and contingency funds for continued supply-price inflation (Brown cited examples showing sharp year-over-year increases for products such as floor stripper and hand soap).

The board requested follow-up materials including: a) precise counts and cost models for custodial and grounds staffing gaps and the budget impact of restoring positions; b) a breakdown of the $5.3 million transportation request (including how much addresses mileage/deadhead costs and how much is contract rate increases); c) details on utility vendor proposals and the composition of the utility increase; and d) an itemized estimate for the routing-software upgrade and anticipated operational savings.