In August, students returned to four closing Pflugerville ISD campuses for a final first day of school.
For months, district officials have taken steps to restructure campuses and operations to address a growing budget shortfall, declining fund balance and lowered enrollment trends. PfISD officials partnered with Civic Solutions Group to create campus profiles used to form 12 draft district optimization scenarios presented in early 2026.
The work ultimately culminated in a 7-0 vote to close Dessau, Parmer Lane and Pflugerville elementaries, and a 4-3 vote to close Windermere Elementary at the end of the 2026-27 school year. Officials say this action will net about $9.8 million in annual ongoing savings.
“The work is not yet complete,” PfISD Chief of Schools Laila Olivarez said during a board meeting this summer. “These four consolidations meaningfully improve our outlook. They do not, on their own, fully restore a structural deficit that has been building over several years.”
Additional efforts are underway, including $2 million in administrative cuts in 2026-27 and discussions around potentially closing a middle school campus in the future.
Closure considerations
A campus’s priority criteria are advancing student achievement, student persistence, investing in people, and finance and operations. These criteria consider factors such as test scores, attendance, teacher retention rates and building utilization.
Diving in deeper
Over the summer, Chief Financial Officer Jennifer Land said PfISD would need to identify about $44 million in cuts before considering staff raises. So far, $42 million in cumulative savings have been identified over the next three years.
2026-27, or Year 0: $6 million in savings through central office and campus reductions, and the elimination of some programs
2027-28, or Year 1: $9.8 million more through campus consolidations and $2 million-$3 million in high school planning time reductions
2028-29, or Year 2: An additional $10.2 million in ongoing campus consolidation savings
“This $44 million is our baseline,” Land said. “It’s what clears the deck. It gets us to a budget that we can tolerate or live with.”
Something to note
District officials have also discussed closing a middle school in the future.
Due to the opening of Bohls Middle School, Cele has the steepest five-year projected enrollment decline among middle schools. While middle school consolidations could financially benefit the district, Olivarez said starting that conversation now could complicate the district’s community engagement process for elementary closures.
“Several [middle school campuses] serve higher concentrations of economically disadvantaged students,” Olivarez said. “Closure scenarios there deserve their own dedicated equity review.”
Olivarez said action from the Texas Legislature could also change the scale of future reductions needed.
Why it matters
Olivarez said PfISD would have likely faced a severe financial shortfall by 2029-30, having just $5.2 million in its fund balance, if campuses were not consolidated. This would have equated to about six days' worth of operating expenses, which would have likely resulted in state intervention, she said.
Even with the campus closures, PfISD risks having 65-70 days left in fund balance between 2027-28 and 2029-30. The Texas Education Agency recommends a 75-day minimum. Currently, the district has 76 days' worth of operating expenses in its fund balance for 2026-27.
“We do not fall off a cliff—which is the whole point of what the board did—but we also don’t climb back to [comfort],” Olivarez said. “We hold the line, and holding the line takes continued discipline.”
What to expect
District officials say they are planning a “deliberate sequence” over the next year to make the transition easier on students and families.
