EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) —The El Paso Independent School District (EPISD) Board of Trustees swiftly approved a $3,000 buyout incentive for senior Central Office staff on Tuesday night, April 21, a move aimed at cutting costs by “rightsizing” the district’s upper management.
The decision comes as EPISD braces for a potential budget shortfall of $5 million to $20 million next school year, according to teacher union leaders. They said the deficit is tied to promised state relief funding and recently passed homestead exemptions that are cutting into public school property tax revenues.
To trim the budget, the district is starting at the very top. In a recent presentation to the board, staff members revealed that EPISD employs nearly double the number of administrators at the director level or higher than both neighboring Socorro ISD and Ysleta ISD, despite serving a similar number of students…