Providence school leaders warn of $10.9 million shortfall and list possible furloughs, program cuts

Providence school officials told the School Board and a packed public gallery that the district faces a roughly $10,900,000 budget shortfall for the current fiscal year and headlined a set of potential cuts that would begin to close the gap if the city does not provide additional aid.

Deputy Superintendent Zach Scott, the district’s operations lead, told the board the shortfall is largely the result of the City of Providence not meeting statutory obligations under the Crowley Act while costs for special education and multilingual learners have risen. “We are facing, potentially catastrophic, cuts that would impact students, severely and immediately,” Scott said during the board presentation.

The presentation laid out a menu of possible reductions already in motion and others that would be considered if revenues do not change. The district has enacted a spending freeze, an overtime freeze and a central-office hiring freeze, Scott said. Further steps under consideration include five unpaid furlough days for principals and some central-office employees, layoffs of roughly 10–13 nonunion school staff who support day-to-day school operations, elimination of winter and spring interscholastic athletics for middle and high schools (the district estimates nearly 1,700 high school athletes plus more than 500 middle school participants would be affected), and raising the RIPTA bus-eligibility radius from one mile to two miles—an action district staff estimated would remove free bus passes for about 2,400 students.

Scott also identified programmatic reductions under review such as curtailing the district’s capital revolving fund and eliminating the ELL-certification reimbursement program for teachers. He warned that deeper school-based cuts would affect teaching positions and teacher assistants, and could pose safety and instructional challenges if enacted midyear.

Board members pressed district leaders on timing, transparency and prior outreach. Scott said the district first raised concerns with city leadership in February and shared detailed financial projections in subsequent meetings, including letters to the mayor and city council. He said the district had previously reached lower-cost settlement agreements (he cited roughly $11 million in one prior settlement) but that the cumulative pattern of level city funding over multiple years left a structural gap.

Scott said the district has drawn on one-time resources including ESSER funds and reserves to reduce near-term pain but that those sources are limited and would not eliminate the structural shortfall. He also said the district is audited annually by a firm selected by the city and that the district is open to additional transparency measures, but emphasized that an additional audit should not delay necessary decisions because of looming cash-flow risks as soon as January.

The superintendent also briefed the board that the district is working with outside cybersecurity experts and law enforcement on a separate network incident and would discuss details in executive session.

The board did not take a final vote on any of the proposed cuts at the meeting. Several members asked for more detail and transparency, and multiple board members urged collaboration with the city and state rather than imposing student-facing reductions. The board also received extensive public comment urging the city to increase funding and asking the district to avoid cutting athletics, transportation and counseling staff.

The next procedural step announced at the meeting was that the district had filed an order with the Rhode Island Department of Revenue to withhold state aid to the city related to the funding dispute; the city filed a countersuit and a temporary restraining order hearing was noted as pending in the courts.

For now, the district’s list of potential cuts remains proposals; the board and staff said they will continue to pursue additional funding, refine financial details and report back before any decisions that would be implemented in schools.