Board adopts a $535.3 million budget in which local taxes cover under 5 percent of spending

What happened

Trenton adopted its 2026-27 budget on April 27, 2026 after a public hearing: total expenditures of $535,321,920, made up of a $481,459,736 general fund and $53,862,184 in special revenue, against anticipated revenues of $509,067,249. The amount to be raised by local taxes is $26,254,671, about 4.9 percent of spending; the rest is overwhelmingly state aid, which the district's own monthly report put at $403,656,121 for the prior year. The tentative version went to the state on March 23 and the county superintendent approved it on April 16. The adoption was item gg inside the consent agenda rather than a separate vote, and the minutes' own narrative of the budget presentation misstates the figure as $53.8 million.

Why it matters to families

This is the number that sets class sizes, programmes and staffing for the year, and Trenton is unusual in that almost none of it comes from local taxes, so decisions in Trenton and in Trenton are felt differently than in a district funded mainly by its own levy. A parent looking for the figure in the minutes would find a summary that is off by a factor of ten.

The evidence

The adopted resolution tabulates 'Expenditures $481,459,736 $53,862,184 $535,321,920' and 'Taxes to be Raised $26,254,671 $0 $26,254,671', while the same minutes record a speaker stating that 'the 2026-2027 budget is projected for $53.8 million.'

The source