Lebanon Community School District announced it is working on reducing next year’s budget, which would likely involve a reduction in staff.
During the first budget committee meeting of the year on Thursday, March 12, Business Director Steven Prososki said the plan is “to right-size our staffing for 2026-2027 and reduce our total budget expenses by $2 million.”
About 80% of that will be from staffing.
He said the district in recent years has seen an average decrease in attendance of 73 students who don’t complete the school year. By March of this year, the district has already seen a decline of 74 students. They’ve also noted that 91 students are attending remotely online.
“So we have a lot less students, 74 plus 91, that are not in our buildings that were there on October 1,” he said.
Projections indicate there will be a much faster decrease in enrollment by the end of the school year than the national average, he said.
For next school year, 60 students are expected to attend Ralston Academy and an estimated 50 enrolled online, making this “the first time in a long time” that Lebanon High School will have an attendance under 1,000.
“One of the reasons we did online was the intention to give students the opportunity to come back, and we have seen some of that where students have tried online and then come back in the building,” Prososki said. “Our intention is to get them back in our building, if we can.”
The school district receives funds by the state according to average daily attendance.
Beside declining enrollment, Prososki pointed out some “unseen expenses,” namely that classified staff can now claim unemployment benefits for spring, summer and winter breaks. The district expects next year’s claims to increase by 30% from four years ago.
Staff do not pay into the unemployment fund, Prososki said, and the money is not paid by state funds.
Other expenses of concern to Prososki include PERS and insurance costs.
Supt. Jennifer Meckley said staff have been meeting regularly to figure out how to cut $2 million.
“We’re gonna try to do most of it through attrition, which means not replacing people that are resigning or retiring,” Meckley said. “We want to be as transparent as possible so people know what to expect.”
Following the Budget Committee meeting, the LCSD Board of Directors:
- Approved the formal naming of the walking path at Pioneer Elementary as the “Brandt Legacy Walking Path” in honor of Rachel and Tony Brandt, who helped make the path possible and invested in students’ health. Teacher Kim Mynar said the path name honors “the spirit of support, perseverance and community that the Brandt family represents.”
- Approved staff renewals based on Meckley’s recommendations.
- Approved a request by Central Linn School District to partner in an OSAA co-op for girls golf and, potentially, boys and girls soccer next fall. LCSD has partnered with CLSD for baseball in the past.
- Reviewed a draft agreement on board operations and chain of command, which mainly outlines expectations of board member behavior. Board Member Mike Martin disapproved of the draft, stating it has 44 bullet points regarding the board and five regarding the superintendent. He asked for removal of the “consequences” to board members who do not adhere to the agreement. The board agreed to submit proposed changes for further discussion.
- Awarded the Early Work Package for Seismic Upgrade at the Seven Oak Middle School Gym to GBC Construction for GMP $521,146.