Board members voted unanimously Wednesday to pass Pittsburgh Public Schools’ $719 million budget for 2024.
The general fund budget marks a 5% increase from the previous year, although the district’s total revenues failed to keep up, increasing by just under 3%.
The district will allocate $29 million from its fund balance to fill that deficit and, in doing so, drop below the minimum level board policy requires PPS to keep in its reserves.
Despite that, the meeting went smoothly compared to last year’s contentious budget vote; four of the district’s nine board directors rejected the 2023 budget, in part, because it carried a deficit.
Board president Gene Walker, who voted against that budget, told WESA earlier this month that balancing the 2024 budget would be “much more detrimental than playing the cards we’re dealt right now.”
Walker said the next step is determining “long-term fixes” in the new year. That could include reshaping the district’s footprint: an early framework for the district’s next strategic plan lists consolidating schools as one way to “maximize resources.”
Salary increases led the district to allocate an additional $4 million for personnel costs in 2024, despite a decrease in the overall number of full-time positions budgeted for at the elementary and high school levels.
In a show of transparency, Walker responded directly to residents’ public hearing questions by providing the number of positions budgeted for at each school level.
The number of full-time employees at the elementary level is set to decrease by about 29 people and 14 at the high school level, per the passed budget.
PPS will also add roughly two full-time employees at the middle school level, and four more counselors to its districtwide roster.
Walker blamed the uneven changes on declining enrollment. The school district now has more empty seats than enrolled students — one driver of its ballooning deficit.
According to the 2023 A+ Schools Report to the Community, more than a dozen Pittsburgh schools enroll 200 kids or less. Consultants leading the district’s strategic plan development have suggested that shrinking schools are contributing to inequities in student resources and disparate outcomes.
During the meeting, board members also voted to approve the district’s $40 million capital plan, as well as hire Dena Young as the school district’s chief of police.
Young assumed the role of interim chief of school safety in July upon the retirement of former head of police George Brown.
Board member Devon Taliaferro was the sole objector to the vote. Young will officially begin her new role on the first of the year.
