DeKalb County Board of Education adopts four legislative priorities for 2025

The DeKalb County Board of Education voted Nov. 1 to adopt four legislative priorities for the 2025 Georgia legislative session: continued funding for school-safety categorical grants, retirement protections for classified employees (seeking access to the Teachers Retirement System or comparable retirement), early literacy initiatives, and increased student mental-health supports.

Board chair Deidre DeCosta opened the virtual meeting and turned the agenda over to advisors who reviewed last year’s outcomes and offered strategy for the coming session. Consultant Ed Lindsey summarized 2024 results, noting the board secured a pay increase and an increase in retirement benefits for some employees and successfully blocked a bill that would have limited the board’s role on school-zone speed-camera installations. "The QBE formula needs to be updated," Lindsey said, calling broader formula reform a long-term effort while urging the board to pursue targeted budget items in the near term.

Dan Baskerville, reviewing the Georgia School Boards Association’s priorities, told the board the GSBA’s top asks include sustaining the annual categorical school-safety grant and increasing funding for counselors and mental-health services; he said GSBA also seeks accountability for programs that send public funds to private providers. "They're asking the governor and General Assembly to continue to fund the annual categorical grant for school safety," Baskerville said, describing last year’s total as about $12,000,000 in the budget and noting that translated to roughly $45,000 per school.

Board members debated whether to press for broad QBE (Quality Basic Education) formula reform or to pursue smaller, more politically achievable line items. Whitney McGinnis argued for narrowly targeted asks likely to gain traction. "I think, strategically, there's a reason it keeps not passing," she said of QBE reform, and urged the board to file specific budget requests for mental-health staffing and other needs while retaining an overarching policy position on QBE.

Several members said they supported a short list of three to five priorities so staff and consultants could begin lobbying early. Allison Gavorz and others recommended folding several concerns (mental health, transportation, poverty adjustments) under an updated QBE framework as a policy statement while separately advancing immediate budget asks.

On a motion by board member Vicky B. Turner, seconded in the record by Allison Gavorz, the board adopted the four stated priorities. The chair called the vote; the transcript records the result as unanimous (announced as "unanimous" and reported aloud as "5 and 0").

The board and its advisors agreed to keep language flexible and to coordinate with GSBA, local legislators and unions. Members also discussed the development authority issue — whether the school board should press for a legislated right to appointment or continue to negotiate for a local seat with the development authority’s new leadership — and generally decided to try to resolve that locally before elevating it as a state priority.

The meeting concluded with the board directing its consultants and staff to refine the four priorities for public presentation at the district’s upcoming legislative luncheon and to prepare talking points and draft language for outreach to the DeKalb delegation and GSBA.