Local School Districts Grapple with Levy Fallout
After Flathead schools’ levy asks failed across the board earlier this month, some are beginning to navigate questions of where to make cuts to stave off projected deficits. Districts must set their budgets for the 2026-2027 school year by Aug. 25.
By Mariah Thomas
At Kalispell Public Schools’ first board meeting after voters rejected its most recent levy ask, district clerk Chris Campbell offered a stark assessment of the elementary district’s budget projection for the next two years.
“I don’t want to make light of it, but the first round of reductions will seem easy compared to what we’ll have to reduce going forward,” Campbell said.
The district last year cut 16 positions at the elementary level thanks to budgetary challenges. It hoped to stave off more with the passage of a $1.1 million general fund operating levy this spring. But amid a challenging levy environment and lower voter turnout than when the district successfully passed its first high school levy in 18 years last spring, this year’s levy failed to pass muster with voters.
Campbell, in a May 12 presentation to the board, predicted a scenario where KPS will face down a $750,000 deficit — minimum — by the end of the 2027-2028 school year. That deficit comes even despite several suggestions to cut costs, like shifting how the district pays employees who work in both the elementary and high school districts. His projection remains uncertain. Several factors, including negotiations, health insurance enrollment, Title funding, and new hires becoming finalized, could either lighten or worsen that $750,000 figure.
KPS is not alone in facing down budgeting difficulties after its levy was shot down.
Three other districts in the Flathead — Cayuse Prairie, Deer Park and Fair-Mont-Egan — are also in the throes of considering where they can cut costs and pinch pennies, even as they have all said they hope to preserve the student experience. Like KPS, some heard projections that they’d be operating at deficits in the coming years at their first board meetings after the election. Some will be looking for ways to trim fat or generate new revenue. Districts across the state are in similar positions after several saw levies voted down on the first Tuesday in May.
Deer Park School’s trustees had a lengthy discussion about their district’s budget May 12 as well. The school clerk described a projected deficit of around $12,000 based solely on the school’s three-year student enrollment figures. That figure is before negotiations take place with the district’s staff, which would likely raise the deficit. Board chair Cindy Barnes said the actual shortfall is likely to be close to $30,000 after salary increases to bring the district into compliance with the state’s STARS Act and other inflationary increases.
Board members in the small district discussed ways to bring in new revenue, like charging community members a fee to use the school’s gym for non-school related events and raising athletic fees.
They also discussed cutting the district’s Crash Zone program. That program, which grants have historically funded, provides before- and after-school care. Superintendent/principal Charlie Wiest previously told the Beacon the Crash Zone program topped the district’s list of areas to cut after the election. At a special meeting held earlier this week, the board also voted to maintain a summer gardening club program, but decided not to bring back summer counseling, tutoring and library programs this year in an effort to save funds. Barnes wrote in an email that “other programs and fees for next year are still under discussion, and will be on our June agenda.”
At a May 19 Cayuse Prairie board meeting, Alicia Scofield, the board’s vice chair, said during her finance report that the district’s clerk has been working on budget projections. The board has an upcoming May 29 meeting. On the agenda: a budget review for the upcoming fiscal year.
Tina Blair, Fair-Mont-Egan’s superintendent, said in a press release after the election that at her district, levies were meant to help pay for staff salaries, maintain grade level configurations and meet technology needs. Those are the areas where she anticipated cuts coming down the pike after their two levy asks failed at the ballot box.
While Campbell’s projections at KPS tee up challenging conversations as the district makes final decisions about its budget for fiscal year 2027 in the coming months, board members in that district also homed in on a broader theme: the state’s school funding formula.
“I know the laws that govern school funding are created in a way for us to run levies every year and that’s how they’re intended to be operated, but I think what voter turnout and the statewide results show is voter fatigue, especially that much between one year to the next,” said Jinnifer Mariman, the newly-appointed chair of KPS’ board.
Matt Jensen, KPS’ superintendent, and Ty Hash, the chair of Cayuse Prairie’s board of trustees, each said in the wake of the elections they hoped the levy outcomes would put pressure on the state legislature to consider changes to the funding formula in its next session, set to kick off in January 2027.
At KPS’ May 12 meeting, Jensen said he supported a proposal from the Coalition of Advocates for Montana’s Public Schools (CAMPS) to change the formula. The coalition’s members pitched their proposal at an April 8 meeting of the School Funding Interim Commission. It marked the first official suggestion the commission has seen to change the state’s school funding mechanism.
The commission must complete a study of school funding in the state once every 10 years and draft recommendations for the Legislature to consider. It has no ability to pass any policy, however.
Topping the list in CAMPS’ pitch to the commission was fully funding the state’s school districts, rather than filling their coffers to the current BASE level, around 80%, and requiring local taxpayers to vote on whether or not to give districts the rest. But a reform of that magnitude, which CAMPS estimated will cost $885 million, is a tall order, Jensen said.
In the meantime, the immediate impacts of the levies’ failures — and where to cut corners as a result — will continue to be discussed and decided at local school districts in the coming months. School districts must adopt their budgets for the 2026-2027 school year on or before Aug. 25, meaning conversations and decisions about cuts ahead of the next academic year will come by the end of the summer.