{"id":868486,"date":"2026-06-15T08:27:22","date_gmt":"2026-06-15T08:27:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/868486\/"},"modified":"2026-06-15T08:27:22","modified_gmt":"2026-06-15T08:27:22","slug":"philly-schools-avoid-staff-cuts-as-parker-council-seek-funding-solution-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/868486\/","title":{"rendered":"Philly schools avoid staff cuts as Parker, Council seek funding solution"},"content":{"rendered":"

The School District of Philadelphia<\/a> will not reassign 340 teachers, climate staff and other personnel and eliminate their positions, after all.<\/p>\n

On Wednesday night, less than 24 hours before City Council approved and Mayor Cherelle Parker signed the $7.1 billion municipal budget, city leaders announced a shared commitment to find long-term funding for public schools.<\/p>\n

Parker had wanted to maintain the staff through a $1 fee on rideshare trips originating in Philadelphia, but City Council leaders did not have an appetite for new taxes<\/a> that would affect residents, citing rising costs across the economy.<\/p>\n

Lawmakers finalized a spending plan June 4 that rearranged dollars to increase the city\u2019s contribution to the school system by $48 million, the projected annual revenue from the rideshare tax. Hours after that preliminary vote, Parker and district leadership indicated that the at-risk jobs would not be saved because the funding was not recurring.<\/p>\n

Council President Kenyatta Johnson called the decision to move forward with the cuts \u201cvery shortsighted,\u201d while Parker declared that \u201cbig tech won Round 1.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both sides agreed last week to work to identify a new funding source to support the positions in the coming months, presumably before or during the next city budget process. In the meantime, the teachers and other staffers will stay in their schools.<\/p>\n

Parker, prior to signing the budget legislation Thursday, said \u201cnothing is off the table,\u201d except a property tax rate increase. She signaled that her administration wants a rideshare fee to be part of the conversation.<\/p>\n

If the mayor and Council cannot agree on new revenue, from a tax or other means, the positions would still be sustained through future cuts in the city\u2019s 5-year spending plan. Parker said the “painful” reductions would primarily come from the city\u2019s capital budget and her Housing Opportunity Made Easy, or H.O.M.E., program<\/a>, an initiative to create or preserve 30,000 units of affordable housing.<\/p>\n

City Hall issued $400 million in bonds earlier this year to fund H.O.M.E. and is scheduled to borrow the same amount in the coming years; however, Parker said the second bond issuance would be reduced to about $200 million, should the sides not find a school funding solution.<\/p>\n

The district jobs were largely paid for through federal pandemic relief dollars and were on the chopping block as part of the school system\u2019s effort to close a $300 million deficit. No layoffs were planned; district officials have said that the impacted employees were offered unfilled spots at other schools.<\/p>\n

But Parker\u2019s team, along with public education advocates and school union leaders, were concerned that the staffing reductions would stifle the district\u2019s recent academic progress.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe leadership of our city recognized that two things can be true,\u201d said Tiffany Johnson Williams, parent of a rising 6th grader at George W. Nebinger School in Bella Vista. \u201cWe can invest in our public schools while also protecting everyday residents from bearing additional financial burdens.\u201d<\/p>\n

Johnson Williams was among those who spoke at a news conference Thursday outside Council chambers to celebrate the decision to nix the cuts. Advocates and elected officials called on school stakeholders to unite\u00a0and push for more funding from Harrisburg, where state budget talks are ongoing.<\/p>\n

\u201cPhiladelphia can\u2019t do it alone,\u201d Councilmember Isaiah Thomas, chair of the education committee, said. \u201cWe put a lot of skin in the game as it relates to this budget. Members have sacrificed a lot to make sure the district has money. All we\u2019re asking for is Harrisburg to do their fair share.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\tKeywords<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\tPhiladelphia,\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t School District of Philadelphia,\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t Cherelle Parker,\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t City Council,\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t school funding,\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t education,\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t rideshare tax,\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t budget,\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t public schools,\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t Isaiah Thomas\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The School District of Philadelphia will not reassign 340 teachers, climate staff and other personnel and eliminate their…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":867262,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5132],"tags":[5229,3232,20497,5310,407,12515,1448,2830,1311,40852,353263,10774,91270,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":["post-868486","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-america","tag-budget","tag-cherelle-parker","tag-city-council","tag-education","tag-isaiah-thomas","tag-pa","tag-pennsylvania","tag-philadelphia","tag-public-schools","tag-rideshare-tax","tag-school-district-of-philadelphia","tag-school-funding","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116753179980446877","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/868486","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=868486"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/868486\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/867262"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=868486"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=868486"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=868486"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}