The legislature’s proposed teacher raises are posing challenges for the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools budget.
Under the state’s new framework budget deal, beginning teacher salaries will go up by about 17%.
WS/FCS Superintendent Don Phipps says the district pays newer educators using local dollars, which means those raises won't be covered by the state. And he, like other North Carolina superintendents, didn’t plan for the salary increases to be that high.
“I'm glad that it is for our educators, but it creates a hurdle that we've got to deal with locally," Phipps said at a Forsyth County Commission meeting on Thursday.
The district’s current budget allocates $1.6 million for pay raises. Now, Phipps estimates that number will need to be somewhere between $4 and $6 million.
He told county commissioners that covering those increases will need to be the district’s top priority.