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Superintendent warns West Jefferson District could lose support funding as enrollment drops
Summary
The superintendent said dropping enrollment could cut the district's average daily attendance to about 520 without protection, potentially slicing support units and roughly $150,000–$180,000 in discretionary funding; administrators were told to prepare staffing letters and consider a hiring freeze.
The superintendent of the West Jefferson District warned that falling student enrollment could reduce the district's average daily attendance (ADA) from roughly 575 to about 520 without state "support unit protection," a decline that could shrink support units and cost the district an estimated $150,000 to $180,000 in discretionary funding.
"That's not just a West Jefferson problem. That's a state of Idaho problem," the superintendent said, describing smaller kindergarten cohorts and fewer births statewide. The superintendent said the funding formula includes a form of "support unit protection" intended to limit immediate funding losses but cautioned that after two years the protection is applied to actual enrollment, which could push ADA down to about 506.
The superintendent described personnel steps already ordered: preparing staffing letters, using voluntary movement and attrition first, and placing a hiring freeze on the table if departures are insufficient. "If somebody who is choosing to retire or choosing to leave the district ... we are on a hiring freeze depending on what it is and then we would move people around to adjust," the superintendent said.
Officials discussed the possibility of closing the small HR school to reduce costs but the superintendent said closure would worsen overall funding because the separate school currently generates support units for the district. "This cannot be an option because of the way that HR as a separate school generates support units for the district as a whole," the superintendent said, adding that closing the school would reduce support units (to an estimated 30.9) and lower teacher counts (to about 34).
On the budget impact, the superintendent said, "I don't have an exact dollar figure but it would be approximately $150,000 potentially to $180,000 that we would not get in discretionary." As context, the superintendent cited a peer district, Lake City, where officials said failure of a levy had left the district facing multimillion-dollar shortfalls and plans to eliminate 40 to 50 teaching positions and to close at least one elementary school.
Board members and administrators framed the discussion as fiscal planning rather than final decisions. No formal motions or votes were recorded in the transcript. The superintendent said the administrative team had been instructed to prepare for next-year staffing adjustments and to bring proposals back to the board for action, leaving the district to weigh attrition, reassignment, or more explicit reductions in coming weeks.
