The current Guilford County Board of Commissioners – which features a teacher, two former Guilford County Board of Education members, a school volunteer and a chairman who loves the schools so much they should just get a room – has been very good to the school system in recent years, and school officials are hoping that generous nature continues when the commissioners adopt a fiscal 2026-2027 budget in June.

The Guilford County school board has crafted an initial budget request for county commissioners that once again brings up a familiar question: How much more will the county be willing – or able – to give?

The school board will hold a public hearing on the budget proposal on Tuesday, April 14 before adopting an official version that will be sent to Guilford County Manager Victor Isler, who will be crafting his first budget recommendation for the county after taking over from former County Manager Mike Halford.

For the 2026–2027 fiscal year, Guilford County Schools is asking the county for roughly $307 million in local operating funding, which represents about a 9 percent increase over the current fiscal year’s county appropriation.

Put another way, the district is seeking an additional $24.6 million from Guilford County taxpayers in order to help fund next year’s operations.

Former Guilford County Board of Education member Pat Tillman – who’s now a county commissioner – said this week that the conversation ultimately comes down to priorities – and limits. Tillman said that, while there’s no shortage of worthwhile needs in the school system, the reality is that county leaders don’t have unlimited resources to meet every request that comes forward each year.

As he put it, quoting another political leader, “You can have anything you want, but not everythingyou want.”

Tillman said that tension is at the heart of every school budget discussion. He said the district’s requests often reflect real needs, but added that those needs still have to be weighed against the county’s overall financial picture, including other obligations and the impact on taxpayers.

According to Tillman, the challenge for commissioners isn’t deciding whether schools deserve more funding – it’s deciding how much is sustainable without overextending the county’s budget.

The schools initial request is part of a proposed total budget of about $961 million, with funding coming from a mix of county, state and federal sources.

But while the total number is large, the debate – as always – will center mainly on the local portion.

And that’s where the tension always begins: County funding is the one major piece of the school system’s budget that local elected officials actually control. State funding is largely dictated by Raleigh, and federal funding comes with restrictions and can fluctuate from year to year.

That leaves the Guilford County Board of Commissioners holding the lever the school system most needs to pull.

In recent years, Chairman of the Guilford County Board of Commissioners Skip Alston has been asking school system advocates to petition the state for more money, and he even, last year, suggested that the county’s cities and towns help pay for the schools.

That request was met with a loud and immediate thud by mayors and city and town councils across Guilford County.

School officials say the current request is driven not by expansion, but simply by necessity.

According to the district’s presentation, the proposed budget focuses heavily on maintaining existing services, addressing staffing pressures and catching up on deferred needs – particularly in areas such as employee pay, school safety and aging technology.

One of the biggest drivers is personnel: The plan includes roughly $13 million for raises for teachers and “classified” staff – those like janitors, cafeteria workers and bus drivers – in order to keep Guilford County Schools competitive with neighboring districts.

District leaders have made it clear that compensation is both a recruitment and retention issue, especially as surrounding school systems continue to adjust their pay scales.

At the same time, school officials say they have already made a series of cuts and operational adjustments just to stay afloat under current funding levels.

Those changes include combining some elementary school classes across grade levels, scaling back instructional tools, reducing tutoring, and increasing workloads for some staff – particularly in specialized areas like services for exceptional children.

Even with those moves, Superintendent Whitney Oakley has said the district is struggling to keep up with growing demands – especially as the number of students requiring special education services continues to rise beyond the level funded by the state.

In other words, school system leaders argue that the request isn’t about adding new programs – it’s about preventing further erosion.

And that message is likely to be front and center as the request makes its way to county commissioners.

It’s very rare for the schools to get everything they ask for. Typically, the schools come in with a high number, the county manager recommends a very low number, and the county commissioners come in with a middle number that makes them look like the good guys.

One time years ago, the school system came in with such a large ask that former Commissioner Hank Henning said it was kind of a relief for him, because usually the commissioners would have to get together with school board members and hash things out, but that year, he said, the number requested was so ridiculously large the commissioners would just have to decide a fair amount of school funding on their own.

In the previous budget cycle, Guilford County Schools asked for a significantly larger increase than what it ultimately received. The district requested an additional $43.9 million but ended up with about $12.3 million in new county funding.

That gap, according to school officials, forced the district to absorb costs internally and make many of the cuts that are now being cited as justification for this year’s request.

So, while the increase in this year’s ask is smaller than last year’s, it’s still substantial.

Commissioners will be weighing the request against competing demands across the county budget, which totaled roughly $847 million this fiscal year.

Schools already represent one of the largest single categories of county spending. Typically, about 45 percent of the county’s budget goes toward school funding and paying off school bond debt.

That reality tends to shape the conversation each year: The school system argues that it needs more funding to maintain services, while commissioners emphasize that they have to balance that request against taxpayer impact and other county priorities.

And there’s another complication this year – uncertainty.

School officials have acknowledged that both state and federal funding streams could shift, making long-term planning more difficult. That uncertainty makes local funding even more critical from the district’s perspective – but it also makes commissioners more cautious about committing additional dollars.

Despite that, district leaders have emphasized that the current proposal is a baseline request, not a wish list.

Oakley has said publicly that nothing in the request is “nice to have” – it’s what the district believes is necessary just to continue operating at current levels.

Whether county commissioners agree is another matter.

After the public hearing in mid-April, a finalized request will move into the county’s broader budget process, which plays out over the spring and concludes with a final adopted budget in June.

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