$168.1M in Federal Aid Now at Risk
EdNews Virginia | February 25, 2025
Fairfax resident Stephanie Lundquist-Arora sent the following letter to Superintendent Michelle Reid and members of the county school board today.
Dr. Reid and School Board Members,
As Fairfax County’s revenue base is expected to shrink significantly with cost-cutting at the federal level, it is increasingly important to live within our means. It was therefore particularly surprising when, on Feb. 20, school board members unanimously voted in favor of the $4 billion proposed fiscal 2026 budget, marking a 7.9% increase from last year.
As you well know, the district’s budget has ballooned substantially in recent years. From fiscal 2020 to fiscal 2026, Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS) has requested an extra $1 billion dollars, in spite of its decreasing student population.
The budget drafters at the county level are unable to fund the school district’s $4 billion request in its entirety. The Fairfax County’s fiscal 2026 advertised budget, put forth earlier this month, allocates $150 million less than what FCPS asked.
Even still, the county’s proposed budget, which increases funds for FCPS by $118.6 million from last year’s budget, comes with a 1.5-cent real estate tax increase, bringing the rate to $1.14 per $100 of assessed value, that coincides with a roughly 8.5% increase on house valuations. Additionally, against voters’ wishes, the county further is considering a meals tax to subsidize its spending.
While county leadership is advocating increases in taxes and spending at the local level, even with a decreased revenue base, FCPS leaders strangely do not seem to be concerned about the likely imminent loss of federal funding. President Trump issued executive orders that are being blatantly ignored. On Jan. 29, for example, President Trump issued Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling, which details the loss of federal funds for public schools that participate in the “illegal and discriminatory treatment and indoctrination in K-12 schools, including based on gender ideology and discriminatory equity ideology.”
On Feb. 14, the U.S. Department of Education issued a “Dear Colleague” letter clarifying nondiscrimination requirements under the Constitution and federal civil rights law. With this in mind, do you intend to change your policies that clearly violate the president’s executive order? Specifically, do you intend to change the admissions policy for Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology to once again favor merit over equity? Are you going to eliminate the millions of dollars currently allocated for DEI initiatives, training, curriculum materials and administrative positions? Do you plan to keep clauses about “discriminatory harassment” in the district’s code of conduct?
Earlier this month, the Office of Civil Rights of the Department of Education launched an investigation into Fairfax County Public Schools with regard to its gender identity policies. And yet, the district’s policies on compelling speech to mandate pronouns, basing bathroom and locker room use on gender rather than sex, and keeping secrets from parents about their children’s social gender transitions at school remain the same.
In fiscal 2026, the anticipated federal aid for Fairfax County Public Schools is $168.1 million when including the money that funds special education, the free and reduced meals program and other federally funded student programs. In addition to the county’s gap of $150 million, without federal funding, that is a budget shortfall of $318 million for FCPS in fiscal 2026. As a concerned taxpayer and parent, I ask, what do you intend to do?
Thank you for your time. I look forward to your response.
Warm regards,
Stephanie Lundquist-Arora
Ms. Lundquist-Arora is a Fairfax parent and leads the county’s Independent Women’s Network chapter.