Budget and Tax Hearing
Broken Bow Public School District held its final public budget hearing before the 2025-2026 fiscal year on Monday at noon. Meeting in the new district conference room, the School Board and Superintendent Darren Toby established a tax rate of .842516, for a total requested tax amount of $9,194,181.00.
As reported previously, the actual amount of tax dollars going to support BBPS is identical to last year. After a general valuation increase in the District of 5%, the rate of tax collected shows a decrease from about .88 to .84 from fiscal year 2024-2025 to 2025-2026. The overall effect on an individual taxpayer’s bill will depend largely on the valuation of their own property.
Tobey noted that the overall tax request for the budget has been relatively steady for several years. The last increase in the tax levy occurred in the 2022 – 2023 budget year, with an increase of 6.7% over the prior years’ asking, and with no change prior to that back to 2018.
Given increased costs for a variety of expenses such as insurance, as well as increases for teacher salaries, Tobey was impressed with the school’s accomplishments within the constraints of the budget.
“If you walk around and look at our facility, how much it’s improved, I think it’s remarkable what we’ve been able to do with the budget over the eight-year period,” Toby said.
Board President Tom Osmond commended Tobey for management of the budget, noting that given how inflation has affected the rate of so many expenses over the last few years, it is a testament to Tobey and to BBPS staff, and that he hopes the taxpayers feel like the school is being good stewards of their money.
There were no members of the public outside of the media present to ask questions or raise concerns about next year’s BBPS budget and tax request.
Other Administration Actions
In Administration comments, Tobey stated the school had re-started its work-based learning program under the supervision of Business Teacher Angie Palmer. The program allows students to work in internships, work-release and job-shadowing programs at the end of the school day.
Tobey noted additional oversight of the program from years past, ensuring students are able to get the most from it.
Asked after the meeting about the status of recovery actions following the fraud theft of $1.8 million dollars earlier in the summer, Toby confirmed that to this point about $810,000 had been recovered ($700,000 initially, and $110,000 more recently). The district continues to work with its insurance company to recover the remaining funds.
The next meetings of the Broken Bow Board of Education will be the Work Session Monday, October 6 at noon and the regular Board Meeting Monday, October 20 at 6:00 PM.
