The Blaine County School District is facing a trifecta of problems: Declining enrollment, a potential budget deficit and a stalemate with the teachers’ union over contract terms.

During its regular meeting last week, the Blaine County school board settled the union impasse — without the teachers’ support — then turned its attention to declining enrollment and the budget implications that will follow.

Fall enrollment for the 2026-27 school year is down about 6.6% compared to last spring. That’s part of a 16.3% decline over the last five years. And this year’s 2,685 headcount is 5.1% below what district leaders projected that enrollment would be when they set a budget.

The largest decline came in kindergarten, which has 56 fewer students than projected, Superintendent Jim Foudy told the school board last week. Sixth grade has 31 fewer students than expected.

Among the students who were previously enrolled but left the district, more than half moved away, either to another Idaho county or to another state, Foudy said.

“The hypothesis is that it’s largely due to housing and the affordability here,” he said.

Another 18% transferred to a public charter school or private school in the area.

This year’s enrollment decline will lead to a cut in state funding, which is distributed through an attendance-based formula. But the impact won’t be clear until next month, when the state calculates attendance from the first two months of the school year.

Foudy said that Blaine County likely will trigger a “protection” provision in state law, which caps drops in attendance at 3% for funding purposes. In other words, the district will get 97% of last year’s state funding, even if its attendance dips by more than 3%.

Still, declining enrollment means fewer state dollars in the long run, and the district is facing a potential deficit.

Mandy Crow, Blaine County School District’s finance director, told the school board last week that forecasting shows a $3.5 million in the budget for next fiscal year, which starts July 1, 2027.

While the numbers are still “very tentative,” trustees should “start thinking about what we’re going to do next year,” Crow said. “We need to start evaluating some key cost-containment strategies.”

These could include increasing class sizes, cutting staff, limiting bus routes and charging tuition for preschool, Crow said. 

School board approves temporary policy to impose teacher contract terms

Also during last week’s meeting, Blaine County trustees approved a temporary policy imposing teacher contract terms for this school year after the teachers’ union declined to ratify a negotiated agreement.

Negotiation teams for the district and the Blaine County Education Association (BCEA) debated teacher contract terms for a year before reaching a tentative agreement over the summer. But union members voted down the tentative agreement last month and asked the district to come back to the bargaining table for a fourth time. Union members sought ongoing raises that could cover the increasing costs to live in Blaine County.

Amid an impasse as the new school year was underway, trustees voted to close negotiations and impose the tentative agreement, which increased teacher pay and benefits by $1.2 million. Imposing contract terms without a ratified agreement is an unusual move, but it’s probably legal.

Last week’s unanimous vote put the tentative agreement into a temporary policy for the 2026-27 school year. The $1.2 million increase includes raises for teachers who advanced on the district’s salary schedule through experience. It also includes increases for health coverage along with one-time, $1,195.65 bonuses and three additional sick days this year.

“This is all language that we talked about with the BCEA during the 50 hours that we worked with them, so nothing has been modified since then,” said Lara Stone, chairwoman of the Blaine County school board.

The policy would be rescinded if the union voted to ratify the temporary agreement.

But the union is still asking trustees to return to the bargaining table. Brenda Southwick, a teacher at Wood River Middle School and the president of the BCEA, told the school board last week that the contract should be “jointly ratified,” and union members still want to discuss a few “narrow, language-only changes.”

“We are asking for language changes and a seat at the table,” Southwick said during a public comment portion of last week’s meeting. “Please return to the table so we can bring educators a revised agreement to vote on.”