- September 16, 2026
We all know the old adage: “There are two sides to every story.” I’d argue there are often more than two.
But there are also stories rooted in fact, stories rooted in fiction, and stories that mix the two.
Last week’s article about the school district budget contained plenty of truth — but it also contained statements that, in my opinion, were highly misleading.
As elected officials, we have a responsibility to be transparent, do our homework and bring facts to the table. When we make public statements about a billion-dollar school system, those statements matter. They affect taxpayers, employees, parents and, most importantly, our children.
Unfortunately, the board member quoted in this article made several statements that need to be addressed. For example, Mrs. Brosemer was quoted as saying the recent budget meeting lasted only 14 minutes, adding:
“I think that's a perfect example of the amount of attention that this board gives a billion-dollar budget…”
At face value, that statement could easily leave someone, who does not regularly follow School Board meetings, believing that the rest of us board members spent only 14 minutes examining a billion-dollar budget.
That is simply not an accurate picture of what happened at all.
As board members, we have the ability to work on the budget throughout the year. We have opportunities to meet with our CFO, district departments, legislators, teachers, parents, community members and others to discuss enrollment, spending, legislation, staffing, capital needs and the countless other factors that affect our budget.
Fact: Mrs. Brosemer acknowledged publicly that she had not met with either our former CFO or our current CFO to discuss the budget.
Our CFO and her team are the people who actually build the district budget. Choosing not to meet with them to discuss your concerns or proposed solutions, and then suggesting that the other board members have failed to examine the budget, is misleading at best.
Fact: In the past year alone, the School Board had at least five significant public opportunities to question, discuss, amend or vote on the budget-including a preliminary budget workshop, tentative budget hearing, special budget workshop and regular board discussions. And at the time of the article, the final budget hearing had not even occurred.
To my knowledge, Mrs. Brosemer has not brought meaningful savings proposals or specific budget strategies to the CFO or to this board during the time I have served with her.
In fact, during last year’s budget discussion, Mrs. Brosemer said she looks at the budget in “broad strokes” because finance is not her strength, and then gestured toward me when she referenced our “open the books expert.”
And yes I do open the books.
I meet with our CFO. I meet with legislators. I talk with district staff, teachers, parents, families, business leaders and community members throughout the year.
I do that because that is the job we were elected to do.
Understanding school finance matters.
For example, Mrs. Brosemer recently suggested selling surplus property as a way to offset recurring expenses. But proceeds from the sale of district property are capital dollars. They cannot simply be used to fund recurring operating expenses such as teacher salaries.
That distinction is School Finance 101.
Ironically, I have been pushing this district to identify and sell surplus property since I was elected. It is an issue I have worked on consistently and we’ve been making some real headway.
Mrs. Brosemer also said:
“There's never any real examination of how we're spending our money … it's just, ‘Do the pluses and minuses add up?’”
Again, the “they” she is referring to is the rest of the board.
Board members who have attended state training.
Board members who have met repeatedly with the CFO.
Board members who have spent hours throughout the year discussing district finances.
I do agree with her that we can do even more to make budget review a year-round conversation. I would welcome that. But meaningful budget reform begins with understanding how Florida school finance actually works.
What concerns me most is that this is not an isolated incident.
There have been repeated public claims about Volusia County Schools that were later contradicted or materially qualified by district records.
April 2025 — Mrs. Brosemer: “We are projected to lose 10,000 students next year.” FLDOE projection: approximately 1,400.
Mrs. Brosemer publicly raised the possibility that Ormond Beach Elementary was targeted for closure. Reality: There was no plan to close Ormond Beach Elementary, nor is there one today.
More recently, Mrs. Brosemer suggested that students attending Richard Milburn Academy were being excluded from graduation accountability through alternative coding.
Reality: RMA students do contribute to graduation accountability, and the alternative coding she referenced did not apply to those students.
There is a difference between asking hard questions and presenting allegations as facts.
Ask the hard questions. Challenge the budget. Demand accountability.
But then it’s our job as elected officials to do the work.
As an elected board member who has spent a tremendous amount of time studying our budget, I find it damaging to our schools and our community when another elected official repeatedly makes public allegations that are later contradicted, are misleading and frequently found to be blatantly false.
So my advice is simple:
Do your own research. Watch the meetings. Read the documents. Ask questions.
Social media posts and opinion columns can say almost anything.
But educating nearly 60,000 children is not a talking point. It is an enormous responsibility.
And those children deserve elected leaders who are willing to do the work, understand the facts and focus less on creating chaos and more on creating solutions.
