MCPS budget hearing: 25,387 FTE request, $122 million for pay increases, $40M benefits gap and new maintenance teams

Montgomery County Public Schools presented a multi-part FY26 operating request to the county Education and Culture Committee that centers on staffing changes, compensation and benefits fixes, school safety additions and a facilities maintenance strategy.

Doug Prouty, the committee’s senior legislative analyst, said the Board of Education’s request includes 25,387 full-time equivalents (FTEs), a net increase of roughly 2.5% from the prior year, and highlighted that a big portion of the increase is directed at special education supports and converting temporary paraeducators into full-time positions.

"A couple of points to note here: the largest number is in terms of the instructional support category," Prouty said. He and MCPS leaders emphasized that enrollment is relatively flat overall, but the district is seeing growth in students with disabilities and emergent multilingual learners, which drives targeted FTE additions.

On school safety, MCPS requested 55 security assistant FTEs labeled discretionary. Chief Marcus Jones said the planned deployment would prioritize elementary coverage gaps (35 elementary positions, 10 middle school, 7 high school), use geographic deployment so one assistant can support multiple nearby elementary schools where appropriate, and focus placements to maximize coverage and response times.

Council members asked about compensation for security assistants; MCPS said a classification/reclassification study is on the schedule for this year and that the district will establish an onboarding and ongoing professional-development program (including mental-health first aid) in partnership with SEIU.

On pay and benefits, MCPS said the Board’s FY26 request fully funds recently approved salary and wage agreements for employees — a compensation package the district estimates will cost about $122,000,000 in FY26 because of the system’s size. Superintendent Dr. Taylor framed the increase as a recruitment and retention measure: "we need to make end roads where we can and keep pace with the marketplace."

MCPS also described a structural deficit in its Employee Benefits Plan (EBP) fund. Staff proposed addressing a $40,000,000 shortfall in FY26 and described a multiyear strategy that combines a shift toward managed-care approaches and a 2 percentage-point cost-share change phased over two years. MCPS staff projected those changes would save roughly $2.9 million in FY26, $8.1 million in FY27 and $10.2 million in FY28 and showed a path to a positive fund balance by FY28 under current projections.

Contractual services increases are concentrated in special education — contracting for occupational, physical and speech therapy after losses in federal IDEA funding — and in student transportation costs tied to McKinney-Vento and other specialized routes. MCPS staff said the tax-supported contractual-services increase is about $1,000,000 in FY26, largely accounting for inflation and higher costs.

For facilities, MCPS requested $9,000,000 and 22 FTEs to stand up three 'facilities task force' teams (each team combining trades such as painter, carpenter, plumber, HVAC technician and electrician). Leadership described that approach as a way to reduce backlog, improve facility condition scores, and potentially lower future capital project needs by addressing recurring maintenance problems more quickly.

Committee staff corrected a small staffing-table typo during the meeting: one line under 'other support personnel' displayed the wrong change but did not change the net total additions reported by MCPS. The committee asked MCPS to return with more detailed deployment plans (for security assistants and maintenance teams) and with an illustration of how each funding stream is being used at the activity level.

The committee will meet again on April 30 to finalize outstanding items and make a funding recommendation to full council.

(Next procedural step: committee follow-up and staff-provided detail before full council consideration.)