{"id":341261,"date":"2026-06-18T12:20:41","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T12:20:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/341261\/"},"modified":"2026-06-18T12:20:41","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T12:20:41","slug":"ysleta-isd-adopts-12-2m-deficit-drains-reserves-down-to-4-5m","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/341261\/","title":{"rendered":"Ysleta ISD adopts $12.2M deficit, drains reserves down to $4.5M"},"content":{"rendered":"

EL PASO, Texas (KTSM<\/a>) \u2013 The Ysleta Independent School District (YISD) Board of Trustees adopted a budget Wednesday night, June 17, carrying a deficit of $12.2 million. The move will bring the district\u2019s financial reserves to a dangerously low $4.5 million \u2014 a level auditors warned could put the district on a path to financial insolvency.<\/p>\n

The total operating budget adopted will total $391 million.<\/p>\n

The budget passed on a 5-1 vote, with Trustee Chris Hernandez voting no and Trustee Shane Haggerty abstaining.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a huge win for workers, a huge win. No jobs are being lost. No schools are closing down. It\u2019s a huge win for the association and our members,\u201d Jeffrey Cynor, president of the Ysleta Teachers Association, said.<\/p>\n

YISD Superintendent Xavier De La Torre said while the district may inevitably cut jobs as soon as next spring, they won\u2019t do it this summer by breaking employee contracts already signed for the next school year.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt may be imminent. I may be back here in March telling people that we\u2019re going to have to reduce the force, but I would rather spend every dime in that fund to make sure that everybody that\u2019s currently employed, that left the school district believing that they were employed at the end of May to come back and start the school year,\u201d De La Torre said.<\/p>\n

De La Torre doubled down on his comments from Monday\u2019s workshop.<\/p>\n

Ysleta ISD counting on school consolidation, attrition, property sales to deal with budget crunch <\/a><\/p>\n

In the meantime, the district plans to offer retirement incentives to teachers and administrators, consolidate the Cesar Chavez Academy, sell properties, potentially ask voters for a property tax increase, and hope the state allocates more funding. But De La Torre said they won\u2019t cut jobs until they have that clear financial picture next March, and when employees simply are not renewed instead of being laid off.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I don\u2019t have to do it today and I can make it through the year, that\u2019s one more year that these people got to work, that they got paid, that they paid the mortgage, that they took care of their kids. And I\u2019m willing to do that,\u201d De La Torre said. \u201cYeah, we could be aggressive. We could be really aggressive. I could balance the budget. Right. We could reduce the force by 400 people. I\u2019m not doing that.\u201d<\/p>\n

There was not much deliberation prior to the vote, but Trustees Hernandez and Haggerty\u2014the only dissenting votes\u2014did again raise concerns over the transparency of this budget process.<\/p>\n

\u201cI will not cast a yes that pretends this was a real deliberation and I will not cast a no. It\u2019s just my one voice was ever going to matter against the board of decided how I would vote before the meeting began,\u201d Haggerty said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI will be voting no but because of the blatant lack of transparency, the lack of gumption to bring us the proper recommendation that was discussed with me, with the CFO and the superintendent of two campuses that should be recommended for closure or consolidation,\u201d Hernandez said. \u201cYou all should have had the gumption to give us a recommendation and let us decide if you know what\u2019s the best thing to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

During the workshop earlier this week, Trustee Hernandez clashed with De La Torre over the proposed budget. Hernandez argued the proposals did not go far enough in preventing the district from sinking further financially, saying the board should have been provided with information and proposals that considered both consolidating schools and reducing the district\u2019s workforce much sooner.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.<\/p>\n

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to KTSM 9 News. <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) \u2013 The Ysleta Independent School District (YISD) Board of Trustees adopted a budget Wednesday…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":341262,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[29062,19054,93151,138,140,139,121720,121721,121722,40995,38523],"class_list":["post-341261","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-el-paso","tag-board-of-trustees","tag-chris-hernandez","tag-de-la-torre","tag-el-paso","tag-el-paso-headlines","tag-el-paso-news","tag-financial-insolvency","tag-financial-reserves","tag-trustees-hernandez","tag-yisd","tag-ysleta-independent-school-district"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341261","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=341261"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341261\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/341262"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=341261"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=341261"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=341261"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}