On March 4, Portland Public Schools Superintendent Ryan Scallon presented his $171.7 million budget proposal for the 2025-2026 school year to the Board of Public Education. The budget calls for investments to increase academic rigor and foster a joyful and supportive school culture, while setting the district on a path to providing more effective instruction to students with disabilities.

The theme of the fiscal year 2026 (FY26) budget proposal is: “Funding Our Priorities.” The FY26 budget theme reflects the fact that the investments proposed in this budget directly align with the priorities of the district’s new five-year Strategic Plan.

The upcoming school year will be the second year of the Strategic Plan, a roadmap developed in conjunction with the whole PPS community, which details what the district plans to achieve over the next five years and how to get there. The plan has five priorities:

●      Achievement: Elevate learning for every student

●      Whole Student: Foster a joyful, safe and supportive school culture

●      People: Create a positive, inclusive workplace where staff feel valued and supported

●      Systems: Develop and implement consistent and clear operational procedures and systems that enhance equity, efficacy, and accountability

●      Equity: Cultivate an inclusive environment where all students and families feel supported

The entire PPS community was engaged in developing this budget proposal. Community members shared their perspectives at a public budget forum held on Feb. 4, and budget listening sessions were held at each school, where staff and PTO members provided key feedback.

Investment Highlights:

All that input helped inform the investments proposed in our FY26 budget. Here are key investment highlights:

●      Early Literacy: Adding Early Literacy Educational Technicians (Ed Techs) to support literacy instruction in kindergarten classrooms at the district’s 6 schools receiving school-wide Title I funding and reading specialists at East End and Reiche elementary schools to support struggling readers. $808,000 for 10 educational technicians and two teachers.

●      Special Education Capacity: Based on the recommendations of outside experts after an in-depth review of the district’s special education programming, this budget makes investments in school-based and central office special education staff. $400,000 increase in school-based personnel and $991,000 increase in department-based personnel.

●      Music Education: Recognizing the power of music, this budget includes additional music teachers at Portland High School and at Deering High School to provide students with more opportunities and electives during the school day. $200,000 for two music teachers.

●      Early Childhood Capacity: By 2028, the district must take responsibility for special education identification and services for 3- and 4-year-olds (with screening starting at 2.3 years). To ensure that the Portland Public Schools is prepared, this budget makes a strategic investment in capacity to hire a leader for Early Childhood who will begin to design and develop programming. $165,000 for staffing, $70,000 for contracted consulting capacity.

●      Multilingual Program Evaluation: This budget calls for a review of the district’s multilingual program to develop the capacity of schools to provide more effective instruction to multilingual learners (who make up about 30% of the total student population). $125,000 for contracted review of the program and $33,000 for ESOL credentialing.

●      Adult Education: This budget contains funding for Portland Adult Education, which is Maine’s largest adult education program and the district’s largest school, serving more than 2,000 adult learners each year, to go through the first phase of a strategic planning process, involving a deep analysis of the school, a review of other programs, and the development of a strategic plan. $150,000 for contracted strategic planning support.

Expenses:

In each budget, some expenses increase from year to year. The following are increased expenses for FY26:

●      Salaries: Salaries are budgeted to increase by just under 5% from FY25 to FY26. This would result in a $6 million increase in expenses before any staff changes are made in FY26. Attracting and retaining teachers and other school staff in this tight labor market is a challenge for school districts across the state and nation. To make the Portland Public Schools more competitive in hiring top quality candidates and to recognize the value of the exemplary employees it currently has, the district’s recent contracts with bargaining units have included yearly wage increases.

●      Benefits: Benefits are budgeted to increase by 6% from FY25 to FY26. Before any adjustments in staffing, this would result in a $1.8 million increase in expenses in FY26.

●      Inflation: The overall costs of goods and services in the Northeast went up 3.7% in the past year. Assuming the same items are purchased in FY26 as FY25, this would result in an increase of $800,000 in FY26.

●      Debt Service: The net cost of the district’s bond payments will increase in FY25 by $480,000.

●      Maine’s Paid Family Medical Leave (PFML): The state has a new PFML program that starts in 2026. The law requires that districts start to contribute to it in 2025.  We are budgeting $505,000 in FY26.

Revenues:

Unlike the City, which can raise fees for parking and other services to generate revenue, the school district is not able to raise revenue and so is dependent on such revenue sources as state education aid, grants and Title 1 funds. Here are some key revenue sources for FY26:

●      Flat state funding: The state subsidy for the district is relatively flat this year, despite the increased needs of district students, including those with special needs and a high number of students experiencing homelessness. This is due to Portland’s increasing property values. A community’s property valuation is a key factor in the state school funding formula, and communities with a higher valuation are expected to bear a larger local share of their students’ education costs. For FY25, the Portland Public Schools received $26.21 million in state education aid and in FY26, the district’s share of state aid is $26.3 million.

●      Use of fund balance: The Portland Public Schools has built up a fund balance. The budget calls for using a little more than $3.9 million to help lower the impact on property taxes while also increasing programming for students.

●      Title Funding Decreasing: Title funds, which are federal funds to school districts that assist schools with high student concentrations of poverty in meeting educational goals, are going down $604,000 or 18%.

Overall Budget and Tax Implications:

The school budget is being presented in the same comprehensive way as last year, which differs from prior years. In the past, the Board has been asked to focus only on the local funds part of the budget, rather than taking into consideration all of the federal, state and private grants that contribute to the overall budget.

For FY26, just as in FY25, the district is presenting the entire picture – including not only local funds, but grants and Title funds (federal supplemental funds to school districts to assist schools with the highest student concentrations of poverty in meeting educational goals).

The FY26 budget presented March 4 has a bottom line of $171.7 million. This consists of a local budget of $162.7 million and $9 million in additional funds. This budget reflects a 6% or $10.3 million increase compared to the $161.4 million FY25 budget.

The proposed budget calls for the use of $3.9 million in general fund balance reserves. These funds lessen the impact of this proposal on the school portion of the tax rate.

This budget requires an increased investment of $127.1 million from local taxpayers, and would result in a 5.3% increase in the school portion of the tax rate. It would raise the overall school tax rate by 42 cents per $1,000 valuation to $8.30. That means that our proposed budget this year would increase the school portion of the annual tax bill for the median family home in Portland (valued at $500,000) by $210 per year or $17.5 per month.

“We are seeking this tax rate increase for the 2025-2026 school year to enable the Portland Public Schools to strengthen academics, enhance the music program, improve student social-emotional health, and enhance our special education services, while also maintaining current programs and services and covering increased costs for salaries, benefits and debt service,” said Superintendent Scallon. “We believe this recommended budget is a fair proposal that centers students, supports staff, provides additional resources to schools, and is aligned to our Strategic Plan – while also being mindful of the impact on Portland taxpayers.”

View the superintendent's recommended budget. View the March 4 budget presentation.

Budget Timeline: The Board’s role on March 4 was to refer the superintendent’s recommended budget to its Finance Committee, which will hold its first review of the budget at a virtual meeting on Monday, March 10. FY26 budget development materials and a timeline can be found on the district’s website.

After a series of meetings and public hearings, the full Board will vote on April 8 to recommend a budget to the City Council, which approves the bottom line of the school budget. The Council is tentatively slated to vote on the school budget on May 19 to send it to City voters on June 10.

The Portland Public Schools is Maine’s largest school district, with nearly 6,500 students, and it’s also the most diverse. About one-third of the district’s students come from homes where languages other than English are spoken—a total of 59 languages. Approximately 47 percent of the district’s students are white and 53 percent are students of color. More than half of all PPS students are economically disadvantaged.