The Fairbanks North Star Borough mayor is proposing what he’s calling a “status quo” budget for the next fiscal year, with $214 million in spending, a 2.14% increase over the 2025/2026 budget.
Mayor Grier Hopkins presented his draft spending plan at a Greater Fairbanks Chamber of Commerce luncheon Tuesday. It includes an increased contribution to the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District — one of the most closely-watched figures in the budget each year.
“It’s the single largest item in our budget at the borough. It’s 30% of our overall budget, is going to the school district – and record funding, once again, this year, building on top of last year’s funding,” he said.
Annual increases in the local contribution to the school district have been the norm in recent years. The last time the borough’s contribution to the local public schools was lower than in the previous year occurred in the 2020/2021 budget, when it went from $50 million to $49 million, according to budget documents.
Hopkins’ proposal would fund the district at $64.3 million in the upcoming fiscal year, he said Tuesday. That’s about $1.6 million more than what the assembly approved for local schools during last year’s budget cycle, but about $1.4 million shy of the school board’s $65.7 million request of the borough for the upcoming fiscal year.
FNSBSD School Board member Morgan Dulian attended Tuesday’s luncheon. In a brief interview after Hopkins spoke, she stressed that she’s thankful for what she calls a pro-education borough assembly and mayor. Still, she said, the proposed amount of funding is lower than she hoped.
“Of course, there’s a little disappointment that that number isn’t what the school district put together in our recommended budget,” Dulian said.
Dulian also raised a concern about sustainability, given that Hopkins wants to use some one-time funds to help foot the bill. His proposal calls for putting $4.3 million toward the local contribution from an $11.4 million sum the borough recently clawed back from the school district after an audit showed district savings exceeded a threshold enshrined in borough code in 2018.
The release of Hopkins’ proposal kicks off the borough’s budget season, and the borough assembly will be able to tweak the spending plan as it sees fit during multiple meetings over the next month or so. Hopkins is scheduled to present the proposed budget to the FNSB Assembly Finance Committee Thursday evening.
The assembly typically adopts the final budget sometime in May, and the borough’s next fiscal year begins July 1.