West Virginia: Statewide SPED debt of $224M
- The end of childhood
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Jan 23, 2026, Prism News: McDowell County Hit by Part of Statewide $224M Special Education Shortfall
McDowell County has a $464,547.53 special education shortfall amid a statewide $224 million gap, putting local services and school budgets under strain.
A state Department of Education analysis found West Virginia school systems spent more than $584 million on special education in fiscal year 2025 while only $360 million in designated revenue was available, producing a $224 million shortfall that touches every county, including McDowell.
McDowell County shows a fiscal-year-2025 deficit of $464,547.53 for special education, part of a statewide pattern revealed after all 55 county superintendents sent one-page summaries of their special education numbers to lawmakers. The one-pagers listed county special education enrollment, federal and state revenue allocations, total special education expenditures, and the revenue-expenditure gap. In almost every county the final number was negative.
Statewide, West Virginia serves 49,402 special education students under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. The gaps reported ranged from a few million dollars to Berkeley County’s shortfall of more than $38 million. Only six counties reported positive line-item balances for special education: Braxton, Calhoun, Gilmer, Monroe, Webster, and Wirt.
Four of those — Calhoun, Gilmer, Webster, and Wirt — receive additional state dollars because enrollment falls below the 1,400-student threshold in the funding formula.
Counties are responding in ways that erode their financial flexibility and risk long-term harm to services. Some school systems are tapping unrestricted fund balances meant for capital projects or emergencies. Many counties without healthy reserves or an excess levy divert staff and services from other programs to remain federally compliant. Those tradeoffs can mean fewer supports for students outside special education and higher fiscal exposure if federal compliance is ever questioned. . . .
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