photo credit: Santa Rosa City Schools
Screenshot from September's video update by Santa Rosa City Schools
interim superintendent Lisa August on the budget challenges facing the district

Sonoma County's largest public school district is at serious risk of state takeover.

Amie Carter, Sonoma County's Superintendent of Schools, is concerned for the financial health of Santa Rosa City Schools District, but the Sonoma County Office of Education, SCOE, doesn't have a direct say over how the Santa Rosa City Schools board of trustees run the district.

Carter said though, if the trustees don't get the district's budget in line, and soon, the board might not have much of a say either.

"If a school district in California, and there's about 10 right now in California, has to take a loan from a state...it's a standard loan, it comes with interest, it takes a lot of years to repay those those loans back," Carter said.

Carter also noted the money comes with some serious strings attached.

"[It comes with] a really high level of state oversight," Carter said. "There's about 150 categories that a district has to meet in order for the state to then exit the system...They step in with state-appointed leadership. There becomes an administrator that's really focused on fiscal issues first and our elected local officials step into an advisory role."

In recent months, Santa Rosa's school board has attempted to take more than $21 million off the books via a fiscal stabilization plan.

That meant consolidating middle and high school campuses across the city as part of the cost reduction effort, but Carter said the district is still projected to fall short.

"They've got about $239 million in planned expenses for this school year that we're in, and a revenue of only $229 million and we already have a shortfall of $3 million in an unrestricted budget category," Carter said. "So we've just reached that moment in time where it has to be addressed."

Carter said layoffs are needed to stabilize the district budget, and maintain local control.

Santa Rosa City Schools is operating on a 100 million dollar line of credit, and Carter said she's concerned about the district's cash flow between April and June 2026.