| By Big Radio News Staff |

The public weighed in on Beloit School District budget talks Tuesday night.

For more than an hour during the public comment portion of a regular school board meeting, a wave of people gave their thoughts on a batch of proposed budget cuts needed to balance the school district’s 2024-25 budget.

The group included parents and school psychologists, counselors and assistant principals whose jobs could be cut. They all urged the board to avoid cutting administrative and support staff positions in the school buildings as recently proposed by an ad hoc budget committee formed earlier this summer.

After the public comments, district Superintendent Dr. Willie Garrison presented new revenues to the board that could help avoid the deepest suggested cuts. These included more than $400,000 from the closure of a tax-increment financing district in the city and moving a few positions to a different district funding source.

These proposals surprised ad hoc budget committee chairwoman Carol Ann Fox. She said she thought her panel hadn’t been sufficiently briefed by Garrison and his team about the new revenue sources in his presentation. She also raised concerns over possible double counting of some of the positions that would be lost through attrition.

Fox’s committee is set to meet again at 5 p.m. Wednesday, just before the district’s annual budget hearing at 7 p.m.