South Bend CFO says district saved about $20 million and used it to raise teacher and bus-driver pay
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Summary
Anaf Kamid, chief financial officer for South Bend Community School Corp, said operational changes — a new health-insurance vendor, insourcing facilities management and other efficiencies — produced roughly $20 million in recurring savings that funded historic teacher raises and higher bus-driver wages.
Anaf Kamid, chief financial officer for South Bend Community School Corp, told an audience that operational changes have produced roughly $20 million in recurring savings and allowed the district to increase pay for teachers and bus drivers.
Kamid said the district switched health-insurance vendors this year, lowering deductibles and premiums while keeping employee benefits intact. “By switching our insurance vendor, we saved $10,000,000 annually,” she said.
She described a legacy outsourced facilities contract that she said totaled $21,000,000 and raised costs after outsourcing; moving facilities management back in-house, she said, yielded about $5,000,000 in recurring annual savings. Kamid also said additional contract reviews and tighter budget controls produced roughly another $5,000,000 in savings, bringing the total to about $20,000,000 annually.
The district, Kamid said, reinvested those savings in workforce pay. She told listeners the district approved a “historic” $9,000 raise for teachers and has set a $53,000 starting salary for the 2025–26 school year. “SBCS is not only stable, we are the strongest financially in our history, and we are now officially the highest paying district in this region,” she said.
Kamid also said bus drivers’ hourly pay rose from about $22–$24 to roughly $28–$30 under a new contract, a change she said will help with recruitment and retention. She said the district is also redesigning inefficient bus routes to reduce costs and avoid future driver shortages.
Kamid emphasized that these changes were made within the district’s existing budget, calling the increases compatible with only a 3% inflationary budgetary adjustment and achieved by eliminating operational waste. She framed the work as applying private-sector fiscal disciplines to district operations: “We have proven that school districts can also be run with the fiscal discipline of a Fortune 500 company,” she said.
The figures and rankings Kamid cited were presented by district leadership during the remarks and were not independently verified in the presentation. Kamid spoke at length about parent and PTO engagement and said administrators plan to use parent feedback in future strategic decisions. The presentation concluded with Kamid expressing pride in the results and a commitment to continue finding efficiencies.
