{"id":401147,"date":"2026-09-16T04:08:15","date_gmt":"2026-09-16T04:08:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/401147\/"},"modified":"2026-09-16T04:08:15","modified_gmt":"2026-09-16T04:08:15","slug":"south-florida-school-leaders-warn-teacher-losses-likely-if-funding-referendum-fails-in-november","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/401147\/","title":{"rendered":"South Florida school leaders warn teacher losses likely if funding referendum fails in November"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>School leaders in Miami-Dade and Broward counties are urging voters to head to the polls ahead of referendums on the Nov. 3 ballot.<\/p>\n<p>The referendums are already in place in both school districts, and approval by voters would renew the funding without any tax increase.<\/p>\n<p>At a town hall meeting in Doral on Tuesday, Miami-Dade County Public Schools Superintendent Rafael Villalobos emphasized the importance of continued investment in public education.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Many of the people living and working in the county are products of public schools,&#8221; Villalobos said at an afternoon press conference. &#8220;We should be proud of that, and want to continue to invest in that. That is our security.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In Miami-Dade, referendum funds support school safety and security initiatives and help increase teacher salaries. District leaders say the additional funding helps retain and recruit educators amid rising living costs.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This would be detrimental to Miami-Dade County Public Schools as a whole because now you can lose high-quality teachers,&#8221; Villalobos said. &#8220;You won&#8217;t be able to attract more teachers just because of the cost of living in Miami-Dade County.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In Broward County, officials say referendum dollars help fund nearly 400 safety personnel, safety technology upgrades, mental health professionals, and approximately $173 million annually for teacher and staff compensation.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This is one of the only vehicles that we are allowed to ask the public to provide additional local effort, making investment in the education that students are receiving,&#8221; Broward Superintendent Howard Hepburn said.<\/p>\n<p>According to Broward schools, failure of the referendum would result in the loss of about $358 million each year, creating additional financial challenges as the district already faces budget reductions.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Our investment in our teachers and other frontline staff is an investment in our students,&#8221; Hepburn said. &#8220;It helps ensure they continue to have the incredible outcomes they achieve day in and day out, which contributes to Broward County overall.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Officials in both districts noted that charter schools are also eligible to receive referendum funding.<\/p>\n<p class=\"content__tags__label\">In:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"School leaders in Miami-Dade and Broward counties are urging voters to head to the polls ahead of referendums&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":401148,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[506,2811,123,125,124,24085,7538,807],"class_list":["post-401147","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami","tag-broward-county","tag-election","tag-miami","tag-miami-headlines","tag-miami-news","tag-miami-dade-county-public-schools","tag-school-choice","tag-south-florida"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401147","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=401147"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401147\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/401148"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=401147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=401147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=401147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}