JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Two Northeast Florida school districts that were staring down significant budget shortfalls say they have balanced their books before the first day of school.
Duval County Schools was on track to fall $100 million short. St. Johns County Schools ended last year $23 million in the red. Both superintendents say those gaps are now closed.
“Right now, we’re not facing a shortfall,” Duval County Schools Superintendent Dr. Christopher Bernier said. “We’ve right-sized our budget.”
How St. Johns County closed a $23 million gap
St. Johns County Schools operates on a 1.5-billion-dollar budget. Superintendent Dr. Brennan Asplen said closing a $23 million gap required cuts at every level.
“In the district office, I cut 8 million and eliminated 20 positions,” Asplen said. “We cut many of our leases — for instance, our portables. We cut 150 portables and moved all those students into any open seats that we had in our schools, which was an excellent thing to do, I think, regardless of the budget. And then we had to cut 120, 130 instructional positions.”
Cutting 130 teaching positions affects class sizes. Asplen said positions do open up through retirements and other departures. As of July 29, the district was actively hiring for about 60 teaching positions. Asplen said he expected that number to be closer to 20 by the time school begins.
“We’re in a position now where we’ve made all of our cuts and balanced our budget,” Asplen said. “We still have openings in which we need to hire folks.”
St. Johns County has seen rapid population growth in recent years, which had previously driven school construction. Asplen said the district is now scaling back those plans.
“In three years we will only build one high school,” he said. “We had like another K-8 and a couple of elementary schools on the docket to build, but we’re gonna back off of that right now.”
How Duval County got back on track
Duval County Schools runs on a nearly 3.4-billion-dollar budget — roughly a billion dollars more than the entire city of Jacksonville’s budget.
At one point, a projected 1.4-billion-dollar deficit made headlines, though Bernier said it was not clear where that figure originated. What was clear: if spending continued on its previous trajectory, the district would have come up $100 million short.
Bernier said the district is still making structural changes to strengthen its finances, including consolidating smaller schools that cost more to operate than the funding they generate.
“We are continuing to do the processes to put us in an even better place,” Bernier said. “But we’re in a pretty good place.”
He added that two strong budget years are encouraging, but he wants to see several more before calling the district truly stable.
“If we continue to have these years, we’ll be able to grow that fund balance — and then we can make some determinations as to how we use that by putting it back in our employees’ pockets,” Bernier said.
Clay County also navigating financial pressures
News4Jax also reached out to Clay County Schools about its budget. A district spokesperson said the district remains on solid financial footing but acknowledged broader pressures facing Florida school systems.
“We are actively navigating the same challenges currently facing school systems across Florida,” the spokesperson said. “Specifically, shifts in traditional public-school enrollment — driven by broader demographic trends like declining birth rates alongside the expansion of state voucher programs — have created new financial realities.”