Maya McFadden Photo
Supt. Negrón to state: "Right now, it's raining on our students."
New Haven Public Schools (NHPS) Supt. Madeline Negrón has now identified 103 positions — 40 of which are vacant, and the rest occupied — that she plans to cut next school year if the district does not receive an infusion of budget-balancing funds.
Negrón offered that budget update at Monday’s Board of Education meeting, which was held at John C. Daniels School.
Her update comes a week after an April 7 Board of Education Finance and Operations Committee meeting, where Negrón announced that she has identified all the “right-sizing” measures she can, and that she now must cut from in-school services and staff in order to balance New Haven Public Schools’ (NHPS’) Fiscal Year 2025 – 26 budget.
Mayor Justin Elicker has proposed a roughly $213.2 million education budget for next fiscal year — a $5 million increase from the current year. The Board of Education, meanwhile, is requesting nearly $231.5 million from the city.
At that April 7 meeting, Negrón said that her team had identified 55 positions that she is considering cutting next year in order to reach a balanced budget. But those cuts would only amount to around $4.2 million. It would take more than 200 total staff cuts next year to close the expected $23 million budget deficit.
On Monday, Negrón said she has now found 103 positions that could be cut — up from 55 a week ago. More than half of those positions are currently filled. Those 103 cuts would result in $5.8 million in savings.
The $5.8 million worth of cuts would result in further combining of classrooms, according to Negrón, along with reductions in staff professional development and increased class sizes and caseloads. It would also reduce the district’s number of substitute teachers as well as summer school offerings and locations. And it would include a reduction in non-personnel costs for general education supplies, contracted services, and legal services.
Intervention efforts will also be limited, like the Office of Youth, Family & Community and its attendance teams, which aim to reduce chronic absenteeism.
What won’t be touched, Negrón said, is the district’s college and career pathway offerings and athletics department.
Negrón said that she plans to next consider the district’s transportation budget. She is looking into whether families, particularly those of high schoolers, will consider an opt-out option for bussing to cut the district’s routes and their cost.
Negrón said she spent weeks combing through the school budget and can’t identify any further cuts to close the gap.
She said her hope is that the ongoing advocacy from schools around Connecticut will result in the state updating its funding formula to align with inflation increases and “what it requires in 2025 to educate a child.”
She also noted the question that is the potential impact of the Trump administration’s continued changes to federal funding.
NHPS Chief Finance Officer Linda Hannans added Monday that NHPS’ deficit this year and next year are the result of the district starting each school year with a shortfall due to its budget requests not being met.
For the 2024 – 25 school year, she noted that the district requested a $220 million budget but was approved for $208 million. So, she said, the district started off this year already in an $11.8 million hole.
Board of Education members Abie Benitez, Andrea Downer, and Edward Joyner responded Monday by calling on local faith leaders to support the school district with summer programming.
Board members Justin Elicker and Matt Wilcox urged Negrón to outline for city alders next week the repercussions of the budget request not being met.
Board Chair OrLando Yarborough said that while he agrees the deficit should be explained thoroughly to alders, he worries about presenting the budget request with an additional “Plan B or C.” He suggested that Negrón is clear on “what we are legally charged with providing,” because with Plan B or C, “at some point we’re not going to have the education system that we are charged to provide.”
Negrón concluded her budget update Monday with reference to the state’s rainy day fund, urging the governor and legislatures to look at the state of public education throughout Connecticut and consider reducing the fiscal guardrails for the fund. “Right now, it’s raining on our students,” she said.
Slides presented by NHPS at Monday's board meeting.
