Board of Education Adopts FY26 Operating & Capital Budgets

June 16th, 2025

On Thursday, June 12, 2025, the Howard County Board of Education adopted its Operating and Capital Budgets for the 2025–2026 school year (FY 2026). The General Fund Operating Budget totals $1.21 billion, an increase of $71.1 million over FY 2025, which represents a 6.2 percent budgeted increase. The FY 2026 Capital Budget totals $100.47 million to support costs associated with the renovation/addition of Oakland Mills Middle School; to begin the design of the renovation/addition of Dunloggin Middle School; other systemic renovations/modernizations, roofing projects and equipment; and ongoing projects such as relocatable classrooms, capital technology needs, and school parking lot expansions.

The Board also ratified agreements with the Howard County Association of Supervisors and Administrators (certificated and non-certificated units) and the Howard County Education Association (certificated and Educational Support Professional units).

The final operating budget builds on the Board’s original budget request to the County Executive in March and includes funding for additional Math Coaches and Specialists and Reading Coaches as approved during the Board’s June 4 work session. Additionally, the Board approved including two student engagement liaison staff positions in the final budget.

The Board also committed $53.7 million above FY 2025 for employee compensation and benefits.

In addition to the reductions approved during the Board’s June 4 work session, this final budget modified the reduction of Health Assistant positions from 33.5 to 10.0; reduced the number of new Float Nurses positions added from 2.0 to 1.0; removed the requested budget addition of 13.0 Athletic Trainer positions; and removed the budget addition of $500,000 for Collaborative Time Per Pupil.

“I appreciate the hard work and advocacy by so many students, staff, and caring family members to help inform the FY 2026 budget,” said Board Chair Jolene Mosley. “While the Board was in the unfortunate position of having to make reductions to balance the budget due to rapidly rising costs, this budget is able to fund special education, Blueprint requirements, and increases to compensation and benefits.”

“I appreciate the level of community engagement throughout this challenging budget process; it is one of the truly great things about Howard County,” said Superintendent Bill Barnes. “Even with the extraordinary increase of more than $70 million dollars in new revenue, difficult decisions unfortunately had to be made that reduced or eliminated programs, services, and positions that are important to us and those we serve. We will support all staff members who are impacted by the reductions included in this budget, and we will work hard to retain them as part of the HCPSS team.”

Howard County funding is increasing $50.0 million to $816.0 million, a 6.5 percent increase over FY 2025. One-time county funding of $1.5 million is included for one-time expenditures in FY 2026. An additional $17.5 million of one-time funding is being used for recurring costs in FY26, which was necessary to balance the budget without further reductions to services. The County is also covering $6.7 million in employee pension costs directly from the County budget that were transferred from the State to the County. State aid increases by $23.6 million to $375.4 million, an increase of 6.7 percent, driven by the ongoing implementation of per-pupil funding increases required in Blueprint legislation.

Additional budget information is available online. The final adopted budget is forthcoming.