Underfunding the Future of Education in Fairfax

Those who control the purse, control the future of our schools 

In the case of Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS), families and staff are at the mercy of Governor Youngkin and the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors (BoS), yet neither are listening to our desperate pleas to FUND OUR SCHOOLS!

This blog will be short as possible so as to avoid a hailstorm of cursing by the author about the fact that FCPS was forced to make tough choices because neither the Governor nor the BoS considered our schools important enough to bridge the $121 million FCPS budget shortfall. Their decisions forced the Superintendent to make difficult choices which will ensure raises for staff, but will involve larger class sizes at all school levels and likely reduction of staff at the Elementary level, specifically the advanced academic resource teachers and elementary special education department chairs on staff. The FY2026 budget process will be discussed at the end of this blog, but first we must discuss some major issues with the budget and the overall process.

Serious Issues with the BoS Budget and Process

Every year Spring Budget season is a circular firing squad among the Board of Supervisors, the State, and Fairfax County School Board (FCSB). Of course, the FCSB always loses, which means school-aged children, their families, and the future of educated employment in Fairfax County are put last in the BoS budget. 

Thankfully, all of the FCSB have been communicating about the budget issues with their constituents, but Hunter Mill FSCB representative, Melanie Meren, really knocked it out of the park with her educational Facebook reels, which really deserve more attention. She also wrote an incredibly brief, but detailed explanation of the historic decrease in funding to FCPS citing the following: 

• Historically, FCPS’s annual transfer of funds from Fairfax County has been a little over 52% of total Fairfax County funds.

• For the last two years, it’s been below 51% which results in close to $50 million less per year disbursed from Fairfax County to FCPS. 

• The Superintendent based her budget on the historic percentage - which has been consistently provided by the BoS, except the last two years, which resulted in a $120,000,000 short fall.

• FCPS has asked for a set percentage of transfer, with no success. 

It is pretty clear that calculated disinformation campaigns swayed the BoS, which was most evident with Mr. Herrity’s comments. Mr. Herrity reiterated the Fairfax Times anti-FCPS talking points about the some of the executives in FCPS, including our hardworking Superintendent.

However, observers were saddened that many of the other Supervisors had been influenced by the repetition of Fairfax Times cherry picked data, which only looked at the salaries of FCPS education professionals, while ignoring the salaries of their Fairfax County counterparts--for example, the fact that Fairfax County employees make 20% more on average than FCPS employees. Even for the top 10 executives, Fairfax County executives make about 15% more than the top 10 FCPS executives. In fact, the top Fairfax County attorney makes 27% more than the FCPS general counsel. (Note: this is all based on 2023 figures).

Also, there seems to be a transparency differential between the BoS and FCPS. It may just be a webpage issue, but for FCPS, all of the necessary documents and links are readily available in one place: https://www.fcps.edu/about-fcps/budget. On the other hand, the BoS webpages are hard to navigate. In fact, it was hard to understand how to participate in the public hearings, and it has been nearly impossible to find BoS public hearing videos.

At least the BoS, FCSB, and FCPS Superintendent know that the process is flawed, and they seem determined to do something about it…we hope.

Fairfax County and FCPS Budget Process

Here is the abbreviated version of the Fairfax County budget process timeline, but please read our blog, “Raise Your Voice about the Fairfax County Budget,” for more information:

• BoS and Fairfax County School Board (FCSB) met on November 26, 2024 and several other times during the budget planning process.

• BoS and FCPS created their budgets:

  • January 23 FCPS FY2025 proposed budget which included staff raises negotiated with the teachers’ associations.

  • February 18 BoS FY2026 proposed budget included a 1.5 cent increase in property tax rate and a 4% meals tax. The budget threatened numerous cuts to critical services to working parents, disabled young adults, elders, successful middle school after school programs, etc. to try to “balance the budget.” These cuts outraged (and possibly distracted) the community. (Anti-tax groups grumbled, made yellow shirts and signs, and yelled “no new taxes” on social media.)

    

    Stop raising taxes folks in their yellow shirts

• The BoS held budget meetings the last week of April, and had a record number of speakers. 4PE was there and spoke in defense of our schools, staff, and students, as were hundreds of parents, students, teachers, union representatives, yellow shirts, and nonprofits speaking their minds. Hundreds attended each of the meetings, the vast majority of which spoke AGAINST cuts to positions that directly serve students and families.

  

  Teachers and parents showed up in force to support our schools!

• On May 6, the BoS presented and voted on their budget markup. There were less than 100 attendees at this meeting, and 4PE covered some of this meeting here which resulted in:

  • 4% meals tax to diversify revenue streams and reduce burden on property taxes.

  • Eliminated proposed 1.5 cent increase to reduce the Real Estate Tax rate by ¼ cent from the current rate of $1.125 to $1.1225 per $100 of assessed value. 

  • No additional money to FCPS budget, but they did expound on failures by FCPS to communicate needs earlier, despite months of meetings and communications between the BoS and FCPS. 

  • A reiteration of the need for a formal process to address the FCPS budget. (It feels a little late, but better than never to make this decision.)

  • A lack of respect for the collective bargaining agreements of teachers, while respecting collective bargaining of police and fire unions.

  • After thousands of responses, they restored funding to the middle school after school programs, but plan to force FCPS to pay for these programs in the future.

  

  Look who I ran into on May 6th! FCPTA Officers!

• The BoS budget choices triggered entreaties by FCPS staff and leaders, including this from the President Elect of Fairfax County Federation of Teachers on May 14, which highlights the impact of the BoS choices, including a broken contract with staff and anticipated cuts in Special Education and Advanced Academic services leaving students with less support and larger classes. 

• On May 22, the Fairfax County School Board passed their budget which included negotiated increases for staff, reducing FCSB and central office budgets by 3%, half non-local travel for professional development, and more outlined here.