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Board advances preliminary district budget and approves pay changes after executive session
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Summary
Business manager Jessica Benefield presented a preliminary district budget that outlines recalibration-driven instructional funding and faster SPED/bus reimbursements; trustees later approved salary schedule adjustments for administrators, instructional staff and hourly employees.
The Hot Springs County School District board received a statutory preliminary general-fund budget presentation from business manager Jessica Benefield and later recorded a trustee action to adjust staff compensation following executive-session discussion.
Benefield told trustees that a statewide "recalibration" in the school finance model created an "instructional silo" that will lock roughly 75% of the district's funding increase into wages and benefits for instructional staff. She said the district expects to see improved timing for special-education and transportation reimbursements and cited potential insurance-rate impacts that were reduced by trust reserves: "They put that guidance up on the website ... they applied a Musketeer factor which took us down to 7.7" and then the trust subsidy reduced the projection to about 2.7 percent in her illustration.
Benefield cautioned that many details remain unsettled — the state must publish rules that determine whether districts or VOCES will front tuition costs and how reimbursements will be prorated — so her numbers are preliminary. She reported the district's average daily membership (ADM) continues to decline, and that some line items (for example, instructional supplies) were reduced under the new funding model even as payroll-related funds increase.
In executive session trustees discussed compensation and personnel and returned with a public motion to change salary schedules. The motion as read on the record described the following adjustments: an average 5% increase for administrative positions, adjustments for instructional staff described by trustees as a 10% increase to base pay accompanied by an increase in step amounts, and an approximately 6% average increase for hourly employees. The motion was moved and seconded in open session and passed on the record.
Trustees also approved a district appointment: Jessica Benefield was named the district representative to the Wizzbate insurance trust board for the 2026–2029 term.
What the board did and what remains: trustees accepted the preliminary budget presentation for informational purposes and approved the set of salary adjustments described in the meeting motion. Because several compensation numbers in the motion were spoken rapidly and clarified on the record, district staff said they will finalize the written salary schedules and publish the precise dollar-step adjustments before implementing payroll changes.
