Eugene 4J approves 2026-27 budget, keeps school days intact

Students in Eugene 4J should see the school day stay the same next year, even as the district works through another round of painful cuts and a deficit large enough to shape hiring, staffing and long-range planning.

The Eugene 4J school board unanimously approved the district’s 2026-27 budget after three Budget Committee meetings in April, preserving instructional time and avoiding the kind of school-day reductions that had been under scrutiny statewide. District leaders said they were never planning to use furlough days or any other shortened instructional days as part of the budget strategy, and no school closures are planned.

That matters for families across Eugene and Lane County, where any move to shorten the school week would have touched schedules, childcare and classroom routines immediately. Instead, the district is trying to absorb a multi-million-dollar deficit without cutting the length of the school day, even as it continues to confront the staffing and program pressures that come with deeper reductions.

The budget vote came against the backdrop of Gov. Tina Kotek’s Executive Order 26-06, issued April 16, 2026, which bars school districts from further reducing student instructional time and requires districts that already cut time to restore it to no less than 2024-25 levels by the start of the 2027-28 school year. Eugene School District 4J also said it paused approval of the 2027-28 budget while board members wait for more complete state guidance on instructional time reductions.

The district’s financial strain did not begin with this vote. 4J’s reduction plan had already identified $30 million in cuts for 2026-27, and later reporting pushed the shortfall estimate as high as $46.4 million, with some projections ranging from $40 million to $50 million. One report said the district could cut up to 269 full-time-equivalent positions as part of the broader plan, and a later report said 4J laid off 176 staff members as it worked to balance the budget.

Notice of the budget hearing and the 2026-27 budget totals was published in the Eugene Weekly on May 7. Even with the budget now approved, the district’s next challenge is bigger than one fiscal year: how to close a structural gap without pushing more of the burden onto classrooms, staff and the programs families depend on across Eugene.