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Page County School Board proposes FY27 budget and asks county for roughly $3.6 million in new local funding
Summary
The Page County School Board on Feb. 26 presented a FY27 budget proposal that includes a 2% raise plus step increases, health‑insurance cost coverage, instructional materials and capital needs. The superintendent asked the Board of Supervisors for a $3,617,818 local increase to restore prior-year losses and fund new items.
The Page County School Board on Feb. 26 reviewed a proposed FY27 budget that asks the county for $3,617,818 in additional local funding to cover pay-scale adjustments, health insurance increases, instructional materials and recurring operating needs.
Superintendent Dr. Huber presented the proposal alongside budget staff, saying the package combines a recommended 2% across‑the‑board raise with step increases, an updated administrative pay-scale structure, and targeted investments in instruction and operations. "Our focus is aligning resources with the mission — support teachers, reduce barriers for students and keep our core services running," Dr. Huber said.
The superintendent and finance staff broke the total request into a "get‑back" component — $2,291,989 intended to restore the division's FY26 shortfalls (underestimated benefits, salary and O&M costs) — and a new‑needs ask of about $1,325,829 for FY27 items. The budget packet also includes a recommended one‑time employee bonus tied to state funds that would require a local match if paid.
Finance staff highlighted several line items in the operational request: an 11.9% increase in projected health‑insurance costs, a large instructional materials adoption and professional development package, hiring a data‑privacy and compliance specialist (fully loaded cost, benefits included), behavior‑support assistants for classrooms, and continued fleet/bus leasing and routing‑software upgrades to improve transportation efficiency.
On personnel, Dr. Johnson and finance staff said the proposal would move certain school bookkeeper positions onto a central office 12‑month scale (yielding roughly a $4,000 increase per affected bookkeeper) and would reorganize some administrative scales to eliminate irregular step progressions. Board members asked for a side‑by‑side overlay of current vs. proposed scales for later review.
The superintendent emphasized that state revenue estimates and the governor's budget actions affect the final request; the board was scheduled to consider approval of the proposal at its March meeting before presenting the formal request to the county budget review process. The packet and staff presentations provided detailed job descriptions, O&M estimates and the rationale for each new position.
Next steps: the board will review the proposal in work sessions and expects to present the request to the Board of Supervisors in March; county budget adoption is scheduled later in the spring. If the supervisors approve a local match and the state budget figures hold, implementation decisions (including hires and scale changes) would follow the normal personnel and budget cycles.
