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Administrators fielded questions about the cuts amid confusion and anger over how staff were laid off or transferred. The public will have two more chances to share input before the 4J School Board adopts a budget at the end of May.
Members of Eugene School District 4J’s Budget Committee unanimously approved the 2026-27 budget and property tax rates at their Wednesday, May 6, meeting.
The $532 million budget includes $29 million in cuts, leading the district to lay off 177 staff and resulting in numerous changes and losses in programming.
During the Wednesday meeting, community members shared anguish about reassignments and layoffs, as well as physical education and music teachers needing to split time between schools. Committee members asked clarifying questions, many about the layoff and transfer process that human resources staff has been working on the past several weeks.
The district’s budget includes using $16.4 million in one-time funds, leaving an ending balance of $14.6 million or 5% of the general fund. Reserves cannot, by policy, go below 5%.
“Our district has reached a turning point where we have significantly addressed how expenditures have immeasurably outpaced revenue,” Superintendent Miriam Mickelson said. “To not take the action now to more closely align expenditures with revenue will mean instability for our district in ways that are very difficult to reconcile.”
The budget now moves to the 4J School Board for final adoption.
Reaction to layoffs and transfers
Luna Berg, a seventh-grade student at Kelly Middle School, came to the meeting with her mom, Jacy Bartlett. Luna was armed with a double-sided sheet of signatures from her classmates who disapproved of the budget cuts.
“When they got rid of the teachers, I was like that’s it, that’s the last straw,” Luna said in an interview with Lookout Eugene-Springfield.
She also came to the meeting with ideas for better funding schools, asking the committee to consider other options, including more community fundraising.
“It surely won’t fix the budget prices, but it will at least make a dent,” Luna said. “And to get more money, we can contact the U.S. Department of Education and respectfully ask for a federal grant to pay the debt because school is important. It keeps society educated and away from the very possible, at this point, reality of ‘idiocracy.’”
Renee Neill, a physical education teacher at Twin Oaks Elementary School, spoke about her reassignment to two other elementary schools, Awbrey Park Elementary and Howard Elementary. The current P.E. teacher at Awbrey Park was reassigned to two different elementary schools, Neill said. She was upset that her request to go a high school instead of multiple elementary schools was not honored, and she was moved to a different area of town.
“Your budget decisions affect real people and real communities,” Neill said. “Right now, this process makes me feel less like a valued educator and more like a number. I am worth more than your offer.”
There is one way a licensed employee can change their assignment. If they can find another staff member with the same level of qualifications who wants to switch, they can go to their union and ask to begin a formal process.
Human resources director Kate Marrone and Brooke Wagner, assistant superintendent of administrative services, said the Eugene Education Association, the 4J teachers union, will coordinate these “voluntary transfers” with building administrator sign-off.
Wagner said they tried to keep teachers at one of their current schools, and she said more than 50% of P.E., music and library specialists retained their current school as one of their assigned schools. Wagner and Marrone noted that although they sent a survey to staff to indicate their preferences, they could not always honor those requests.
Marrone said the “reduction in force,” commonly known as the RIF process, is web-like, not linear. In order to fulfill collective bargaining agreement language and Oregon law, she said HR staff must look at an individual’s job rights (full-time or part-time), experience, seniority and endorsements while looking at what each school needs based on enrollment.
As part of the budget reduction, 265 full-time equivalent positions were expected to be cut. This included individuals who received layoff notices Friday: 102 licensed staff members, 66 classified staff and nine managers.
The district used savings from retirements and resignations, along with other specialized funds for certain positions, to make up the remainder of the money represented by the 265 FTE positions.
A perfect storm
The 4J district’s budget pressures resulted from multiple colliding factors.
The district’s expenses exceeded revenues for the past two years, as 4J spent down built-up reserves to retain staff hired after the COVID-19 pandemic with relief money. The district ran out of relief money in the fall of 2024.
Enrollment, which is directly tied to state funding, has declined annually since 2020. It’s expected to drop by 171 students this fall, a 1.2% decrease. This past year, enrollment dropped by 264 students, a 1.8% decline. The district is not alone in its enrollment decline — districts across the state are seeing lower numbers of students. But 4J’s enrollment is falling faster than the state average, according to district data.
Experts chalk up the decline to falling birth rates and rising home prices. There is also a growing number of families choosing other options, including homeschooling and online charter schools.
The district’s Public Employees Retirement System side account, an investment fund that contributes dividends to its pension payments, will also phase out earlier than expected. This means 4J will be on the hook to pay for the full principal and interest payment to its PERS bond holders on top of the full PERS contribution for May and June 2027 for the future fiscal year, and for several months into the following fiscal year.
The account was spent down faster than expected due to a year of underperforming investments and an unexpected increase in payroll costs from hiring additional staff with COVID-19 relief funds.
The 4J School Board will have an official budget public hearing May 13 and is expected to vote on budget adoption May 27. Members of the public can sign up to speak at either meeting.
