The Broward School Board will ask voters this year to extend a tax for employee safety, mental health and employee pay — but not for the employees whose bonuses recently created outrage.
School Board members approved the language that will appear on the Nov. 3 ballot at a meeting on Tuesday. A workshop is planned for March 30 for board members to discuss in more detail how the money would be distributed.
Voters will be asked to renew a property tax increase they approved in 2022 equal to $100 per $100,000 in assessed property.
Board members promised on Tuesday that the money will benefit teachers and not the highest-paid administrators.
“I’ve spent the last few years talking to people in the community, and I’ll tell you what I’ve learned loud and clear, which is that Broward County supports increasing educator pay,” School Board member Allen Zeman said at Tuesday’s meeting. “The best way to do that is to give the people what they want and to make it crystal clear what we’re going to spend this money on.”
Zeman called the passage of the referendum “life or death” for the district, which is trying to keep teacher pay competitive while facing about $80 million in budget cuts due to declining enrollment. If voters say no, referendum supplements, which are now between $500 for recently hired to $12,000 for veteran teachers, would go away. The range could change if the referendum is renewed.
Zeman also has voiced concern that a recent controversy over the 2022 referendum may sour voters.
This would be the third referendum for security, mental health and employee pay. The first one, passed in 2018, limited supplements primarily to teachers. The last referendum, approved in 2022, doubled the tax and expanded the pool of recipients to teachers and staff but didn’t specifically state which non-teachers would be eligible until after the referendum passed.
In 2023, School Board members voted to exclude the highest-paid administrators, but that exemption was removed without public discussion in 2024, and it resulted in administrators making more than $200,000 a year collecting bonuses of up to $14,000.
Most School Board members said they were unaware they’d approved these payments until contacted by the South Florida Sun Sentinel, and they voted on Jan. 6 to stop paying them. An audit found that district staff were not transparent with the public when they added the high-paid administrators to a School Board agenda.
“In no circumstance will anybody who was the subject of dispute last time be entitled to any of this money, as far as I’m concerned,” Adam Cervera, who was not on the board when bonuses were approved, said at Tuesday’s meeting. “This is going to fund school safety personnel, mental health services and compensation for teachers. … That’s not raises for people who are making six figures.”
While board members agreed they don’t want the money to go to an administrator working in the district’s downtown office, they differed on how narrow the pool of employees should be.
Zeman proposed limiting it to “teachers and essential educators.”
He said if the district collects $300 million per year, there may be enough money to give teachers supplements of $15,000 to $18,000 a year, rather than a maximum of $12,000. But that plan would have left out cafeteria workers, bus drivers and food service workers.
Zeman said if the district used referendum dollars to give teachers larger salaries than they make now, it would free up money elsewhere in the budget and would provide “the opportunity for the administration and the school board to work to find efficiencies to pay the bus drivers” and other employees.
Board member Debbi Hixon disagreed, saying she thinks the referendum might have a hard time passing if support staff aren’t included. She said these employees directly impact students. Hixon said students won’t perform well “if we don’t get them to school, if we don’t feed them.”
Hixon suggested adding language to say employees who directly impact students would get supplements, an idea Board Chairwoman Sarah Leonardi rejected.
“You have attorneys in the general counsel’s office that do work that directly impacts students. Like when they are working on lawsuits, that directly impacts students,” Leonardi said, adding board members have been clear they don’t want lawyers collecting referendum dollars.
Board members finally landed on language that would provide money to “teachers and school-based and support staff.”
While the previous ballot measures listed safety and security first, mental health second and teacher pay third, several board members suggested reversing the order to include teacher pay first, saying it might increase chances of passage.
But Board member Lori Alhadeff, whose daughter Alyssa was killed in the Parkland tragedy, voiced strong opposition to that idea.
“School safety and mental health services are the most important part, because if your children don’t come home alive, then nothing else matters,” she said.
The final language approved for the ballot is as follows:
Fund School Employee Pay, Safety, and Mental Health through a One-Mill Property Tax Levy
To enhance school safety and mental health services, recruit and retain highly qualified teachers and essential employees, improve student achievement, and support critical school operations, shall the School Board of Broward County continue to levy a one-mill ad valorem property tax from January 1, 2027, through December 31, 2030, to fund school safety personnel, mental health services, increased compensation for teachers, and school-based and support staff for public and charter schools?