Three Years, Zero Tax Hikes: Scranton Schools Finally Turn the Corner

Three years. Zero tax hikes. And after a decade of chaos, that shouldn’t be remarkable — but in Scranton, it is.

This week, the Scranton School Board unanimously advanced its proposed 2026 budget, locking in a third straight year without raising property taxes. For a district that was once synonymous with fiscal crisis, shuttered classrooms, and cuts that gutted our schools, the turnaround didn’t happen by accident. It happened because the voters finally changed who was sitting at the table.

People forget just how bad things got under the previous board leadership — the era of Ro Hume, Katie Gilmartin, Tara Yanni, and Catherine Fox. Taxes went up dramatically, year after year. Music was cut. Art was cut. Libraries were eliminated entirely. Preschool was slashed. Bancroft was closed, which directly caused today’s space crisis and overcrowding across elementary schools. Those decisions weren’t unfortunate necessities — they were choices, made by a board that consistently mismanaged the district into academic and financial decline.

That era ended with the new board: Bob Casey, Sean McAndrew, Ty Holmes, Marie Merkle, Tom Borthwick, Danielle Chesek, and appointed replacements of Yanni and Gilmartin, Jenna Strzelecki and Joe Triano. In three years, this board has done the opposite of its predecessors — not through slogans, but through action.

They restored preschool. They brought back music and the arts. They stabilized the finances to the point that the district hasn’t needed a tax anticipation loan in recent years. And now, in the newly passed budget, they are bringing back elementary libraries — something parents, teachers, and students have begged for since the previous board eliminated them.

And they did all of this without raising taxes for three straight years.

The 2026 budget also survives the uncertainty of Lackawanna County’s reassessment. The district is holding the line on its millage rate, even while preparing for the technical rate adjustment that every taxing body must make once new assessments are certified. That means the school district isn’t driving any tax fluctuations — reassessment itself is. State law requires the district to remain revenue neutral after reassessment, and this board is following the law.

Even with rising costs — special education, cyber charter tuition, transportation, contractual salary increases — Scranton is still investing in classrooms, not cutting them. The reason they planned a potential revenue anticipation note wasn’t mismanagement — it was the Republican-controlled State Senate dragging out a historic budget impasse that froze billions statewide, forcing school districts across Pennsylvania to brace for the worst. Once the stalemate broke, Scranton’s board still kept the TAN authorization only as a precaution, not a necessity.

It’s simple: good governance matters. Who you elect matters.

Under the last board majority, Scranton schools were stripped down, demoralized, and pushed to the brink — while taxpayers paid more and got less.

Under the current board, Scranton is rebuilding programs, restoring opportunity, and protecting taxpayers — all at the same time.

Three years. Zero tax increases. And for the first time in a long time, real progress.