Santa Rosa, CA: 70% increase in SPED costs 2016 to 2025 to nearly $72 million

Aug 15, 2026, Press Democrat: Deep cuts to special education programs mark new era at Santa Rosa City Schools

Santa Rosa, CA

When Renee Blair’s son, who has a diagnosed learning disability, was moved out of general education classes and into specialized classes in Santa Rosa City Schools almost a decade ago, everything changed.

The special education program, called special day classes, is a fixture in the county’s biggest school district — the classes offer students with special needs a dedicated academic setting, led by a credentialed special education teacher, surrounded by other students with similar needs and supported by a number of classroom aides.

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The classrooms can help students with disabilities — like Blair’s son who is now a junior — better connect with academic and social concepts. When her son was in elementary school, he started off in the general education classes, which have more students and are not led by specialized staff.

“I believe in inclusion, I really do, and I thought, ‘He can do general education,’” Blair said.

But that belief eroded over time, Blair said.

“I volunteered in the classroom a lot and I looked around and just as a parent and as a teacher, I said, ‘This is affecting all of the other students in the classroom too,'” she said. 

After witnessing her son struggling to connect with the classroom material, she requested a more specialized placement within the district.

“The next year that he was in (a special day class) and it was like night and day: in his attitude about school, wanting to go, wanting to learn,” Blair said. “Especially at the elementary level, he needed that.”

But the success and confidence that Blair saw in her son is now at risk. 

Starting this school year in Santa Rosa, the roughly 100 students who had been enrolled in those specialized classes will be relocated, and the special day classes will cease to exist.

In February, district leaders approved a set of sweeping, budget-driven cuts that teachers, parents and advocates worry will impact the more than 2,500 Santa Rosa students in special education for years to come. That share represents about 20% of the districtwide student body.

Also set to be eliminated: a secondary inclusion initiative that paired general education and special education teachers together for core academic subjects, allowing greater inclusion of special education students within the general student population.

The changes come as the district looks to curb an escalating cost curve for special education, which shot up 70% from 2016 to 2025, to nearly $72 million, comprising an ever-larger chunk of the overall budget.

To rein in costs and capture more per-pupil revenue, district leaders have vowed to create their own Special Education Local Plan Area, or SELPA, an agency that currently exists in a countywide format in order to help school districts oversee special education programs and manage complaints from parents. The county’s SELPA has proven in recent years to be a fiscal drain for Santa Rosa City Schools, which last year said it would lose nearly $3.5 million annually if it remained in the county cohort.

The changes to the special education programs come as Santa Rosa City Schools seeks to stabilize its finances after facing the worst fiscal crisis in its history. The emergency, which raised the risk of state takeover, led to the closure of six campuses over two years through this past June and the reconfiguration of four high schools into seven to 12 campuses.  . . .

The proposed changes to special education programs were accompanied by the layoffs of almost 20 special education staff, a move expected to save just over $3.2 million.

“Without the appropriate supports, financial supports in the classroom, people — trained people — it’s going to be catastrophic,” an elementary special education teacher said in April. The teacher, and others interviewed for this story, spoke with The Press Democrat on the condition their names were withheld, fearing retaliation from the district. . . .

Changes at the elementary level

The district’s youngest students will see some of the harshest cuts. . . .

In the 2025-26 school year, at Santa Rosa City Schools’ elementary campuses, there were two general tiers of support for the 855 students receiving special education services from preschool through sixth grade. The first tier, called special day classes, or SDCs, are small classes made up of no more than 15 students and taught by a credentialed special education teacher who is accompanied by instructional aides.

The classrooms are staffed on a ratio where, for every two students, there must be one adult.

By eliminating these classes and letting go of the large number of staff required by law to educate these groups of students, the district will save at least $500,000, Fischer said.

Teachers say the benefit of an SDC placement for a student is in the classroom staff that cater specifically to a student’s specific disabilities, including a credentialed special education teacher and their aides.

The second tier of support — if it is determined that a student would be better served in a class with more supervision — is called an Extensive Support Needs, or ESN, classroom.

“My students can vary from being completely nonverbal and have low academic skills versus SDC students, who can have lower academic development but not as severe as students in ESN,” said an elementary special education teacher who leads an ESN classroom. She requested her name be withheld for fear of retaliation. “SDC and ESN are not the same. They do not serve the same needs.”

That teacher and others fear that without special day classes, students will be placed in classroom settings like hers that are ultimately the wrong placement. . . .

He pointed to the district’s elementary special education “program classes,” which are another subset of classrooms that serve a highly specific group of students. One program, called RISE, mostly serves students on the autism spectrum and focuses on helping students connect mostly with academics. There are almost 40 elementary students in this program and another 50 in middle and high schools. . . .

 “We don’t have intervention support, we don’t have teachers on special assignment,” she continued. “I’m worried we won’t have anything to help these kids.”

At the end of the 2024-25 school year, trustees approved layoffs for seven “teachers on special assignment,” which are teachers hired to tackle specific district initiatives. That school year, those seven teachers helped with reading and math intervention for all students.

Three school psychologists were also let go that year. Those staff helped to test and identify students for special education services. Three more psychologists were let go this June and will not return to campuses on Monday when the new school year begins.

About 10 classroom assistants also were cut in layoffs approved in the 2023-24 and 2024-25 school years. . . .