Fort Bend ISD approves fiscal year 2026-27 budget with $32.8M shortfall

Fort Bend ISD’s 2026-27 fiscal year budget includes a $32.8 million shortfall.

The budget includes a compensation plan with targeted investments designed to attract, retain and reward educators and support staff, district officials announced in a June 16 news release.

What you need to know

At a June 15 meeting, the Fort Bend ISD board of trustees voted unanimously to approve the FY 2026-27 budget with a $32.8 million shortfall, which was initially predicted at $26.2 million last summer and rose as high as $56.4 million in February.

The budget includes a compensation plan featuring differentiated teacher steps, state funded teacher retention allotment and staff retention allotment and a second-year thank you supplement for for employees who do not qualify for the TRA or SRA programs as well as bus driver and monitor pay increases.

Additional budgeted expenditures include:

• Expansion of the district’s Pre-K3 program
• Additional of a two-way dual language program and Mandarin immersion program
• New middle school choice programs
• Upcoming virtual learning opportunities for high school students

In regards to the child nutrition fund, Schlacks said no meal price changes are to be made, but there will be price revisions for a la carte snack items.

Diving in deeper

Schlacks said the tax rate is expected to be $0.9969 per $100 valuation—a 6 cent decrease from the previous year due to seven disaster pennies expiring at the end of the 2025-26 tax year—and the interest and savings tax rate increasing by 1 cent, which was already voted on by residents during the 2023 bond election.

Additionally, Deputy Superintendent of Operations Kathleen Brown previously said the district does not plan to make any changes to the employee health benefit premiums for the 2026-27 school year after hearing committee recommendations, although staff will continue to look at potential health benefit changes for the 2027-28 school year.

Also of note

Brown outlined to the board several ways the district is working towards fairly compensating employees for the 2026-27 fiscal year:

• Differentiated teacher steps
• State funded teacher retention allotment and staff retention allotment
• Second-year thank you supplement
• Year 3 and 5 teachers will receive higher teacher retention allotment
• Bus driver/monitor pay increases

In July, FBISD will receive the certified tax roll from the Fort Bend Central Appraisal District and the maximum compressed rate from the Texas Education Agency before the tax rate is voted on in September.