The ISD 200 School Board adopted the 2026 levy and budget with a 1.9% decrease in the levy, translating into a $64 decrease for homes valued at $300,000, near the average home price in Hastings.
“That’s good news for taxpayers,” said ISD 200 School Board Chair Carrie Tate.
This decrease in levy is partially due to the rising tax base and market value of properties in Hastings. Hastings’ tax base increased by 1.61% last year, with the referendum market value of properties in town rising by 2.17%, according to ISD 200 Finance Manager Jen Seubert.
Much of the 2026 budget, like most school budgets, is dominated by staff benefits and salaries.
More than 91% of expenses within the 2026 budget relate to staff salaries, benefits or contracted services like substitute teachers and busing.
“We are definitely a people business,” said Siebert.
Much of the decrease comes from “prior year adjustments” in which the district had overestimated budgets and had funds left over, such as for the PSEO program in the high school, said Siebert.
Another factor is the continued declining enrollment district wide.
Next year, the district is expecting a loss of 83 pupil units or a drop of 2.16%, with much of that decline coming from the older grades which are far larger than the incoming grades.
For example, the graduating class this year is 377 students. That incoming class for the 2026-2027 school year is estimated to be 253 students.
“That’s where the majority of our declining enrollment is coming from,” said Siebert.
According to current school projections, by 2031, ISD 200 will drop below 4,000 total pupil units. It currently has 4,318 pupil units.
While Siebert was optimistic about much of the past work of the district, especially in maintaining healthy fund balances, she was wary of providing any kind of overall assessment of the district’s future: “Legislatively, there’s just always things that can come that are unexpected as much as we try to prepare for them.”

Future referendum
The district’s current operating referendum #1 is set to end in 2028. That referendum can be renewed between July 1, 2025 and June 15, 2027 at its current level by the school board. If the district would like to ask for more funds, it would need to go to an election for voter approval either in November of next year or in 2027.
“Those are the conversations we need to have,” said Superintendent Wehrkamp Herman. Wehrkamp Herman recommended surveying the district before beginning the process of a vote to see if the community has an appetite for raising the referendum. That work would take place over the next month, said Wehrkamp Herman.

MSBA resolutions
Earlier this month, three members of the ISD 200 School Board attended the Minnesota School Board Association (MSBA) delegate assembly. The MSBA delate assembly has school board members from across the state vote on resolutions that the MSBA will then lobby for during the upcoming legislative session.
The Hastings school board submitted or signed onto similar resolutions for 10 of the 36 resolutions that came before the delate assembly.
“We were by far the biggest contributor of resolutions this year,” said Tate.
Of those resolutions, all but one passed. Passed resolutions included providing districts with additional time to prepare for financial impacts of new laws, mandating the inclusion of the fiscal impact on school districts for new legislation, fully funding unemployment insurance, and allowing school board candidates to omit their address on campaign materials.
The resolution that did not pass was repealing the Alternative Teacher Professional Pay System program, often referred to as Q-Comp.
“It was a great experience again,” said Tate.

Spark grants
Several teachers across the district received SPARK grants from the St. Croix Valley Foundation on projects ranging from new tech to an outdoor classroom to funds for Hastings Reads.
One such project was $15,000 for prairie restoration in 4.25 acres at Kennedy Elementary School, which will be turned into a shortgrass prairie with wildflowers, in cooperation with Prairie Restoration.
“That will be an opportunity for students to study how diversity of plants and animals can change compared to lawn grass,” said Jill Jensen, a STEM teacher at Kennedy.
Another project was $15,000 for new plasma cutters at the high school. Currently the metals classes use hand-held cutters, which can limit the quality of projects.
“This is going to open up a lot of opportunities for them to build and design a lot of higher-quality products and have a much more rich learning experience,” said Nathan Neuman, an industrial tech teacher at the high school.
“I’m envious of our students right now. We have a lot going on,” said Tate.