The Carroll ISD board of trustees approved a $112 million budget for the 2017-18 school year at its Monday night meeting.
The approved budget is a deficit budget as expenditures exceed revenue. The district estimates that revenue will be $107.2 million, which means the district will have to take $4.8 million from its fund balance to cover the deficit.
The budget also includes a 3 percent increase for teachers' salaries along with a half cent property tax rate decrease to the debt service fund, or the portion of the tax rate used to pay off bonds.
"Whenever we can, we do take the taxpayers into consideration," trustee Read Ballew said on decreasing the tax rate.
Assistant Superintendent of Financial Services Scott Wrehe said the district has the capacity to decrease the rate and still remain fiscally conservative.
“We continue to be conservative, but I do think there is a little bit of room to decrease,” Wrehe said.
The budget also includes a Chapter 41, or "Robin Hood," payment of $26 million. The district sent a payment of $19 million to the state in the previous fiscal year as part of the recapture program that mandates "property-rich" districts such as CISD give funds to the state to be redistributed among "property-poor" districts.