The school year is about to begin—see how much your district received in federal pandemic relief

By

Ballotpedia staff

Welcome to the Monday, July 28, 2025, Brew. 

By: Lara Bonatesta

Here’s what’s in store for you as you start your day:

  1. The school year is about to begin—see how much your district received in federal pandemic relief  
  2. San Tan Valley, Arizona, voters to decide whether to incorporate a new 100,000-person town on Aug. 5
  3. Did you know that voters decided an average of 33 statewide ballot measures during odd-numbered years between 2011 and 2023?

The school year is about to begin—see how much your district received in federal pandemic relief  

Between 2020 and 2021, Congress provided roughly $190 billion in aid to K-12 school districts as part of a program called Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER). As students around the country prepare to go back to school in the coming months, districts are navigating deadlines to use those funds, affected by a legal dispute over the federal government’s decision to revoke deadline extensions.

Initially, districts were required to have spent the final round of funding by January 2025, though as of May 11, 47 states and several outlying areas received extensions that now end on March 30, 2026. If districts don’t spend ESSER funds by that date, they will lose access to them.

To help readers understand what’s happening in their districts, Ballotpedia has compiled data on the amount of pandemic relief funding K-12 public school districts received since 2020. 

Congress sent districts $190 billion and put a few strings on how they spent it

Congress sent K-12 public school districts roughly $190 billion through three rounds of ESSER funding between March 2020 and March 2021. President Donald Trump (R) signed the first two packages in 2020, and President Joe Biden (D) signed the third in 2021. 

Congress allocated ESSER funds using Title I formulas of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 (ESEA). Districts with higher numbers or percentages of low-income students generally received more funding.

On average, states received $3,328 per pupil. The states with the highest per-student allocations are Mississippi ($5,240), New York ($5,148), and Louisiana ($4,632). The states with the lowest per-student allocations are Utah ($1,241), Colorado ($1,847), and Idaho ($1,959). 

Congress required districts to spend at least 20% of the funding addressing what it called learning loss, but placed few restrictions on the rest of the money. Consequently, districts spent the funding in a variety of ways, from purchasing COVID-19 disinfecting equipment and renovating facilities to tutoring services and hiring new teachers.

Democratic-led states sued the U.S. Department of Education over its extension policies  

In February 2025, the U.S. Education Department estimated that about $2.5 billion of the funding had yet to be spent, and granted districts in 41 states until March 30, 2026, an additional 14 months, to do so. 

However, in a letter sent to state chiefs of education on March 28, U.S. Department of Education Secretary Linda McMahon announced that the department was canceling those extensions effective that day. In response, 16 states—all but one with Democratic governors—and Washington, D.C., sued the department, stating programs and services meant to “combat the long-term effects of the pandemic will have to be dissolved or disbanded.”

On May 6, U.S. District Court Judge Edgardo Ramos issued a preliminary injunction blocking the department from canceling the extensions, but only for districts in the 16 states that sued.

On June 27, following additional litigation, McMahon sent another letter to non-plaintiff states granting all districts access to unspent funds until March 2026 while litigation continues. In the letter, McMahon cited “basic fairness and uniformity problems.” 

Districts are dealing with the end of ESSER funding and declining enrollment 

The end of ESSER funding, along with declining enrollment in parts of the country, has posed a challenge to districts that put the federal pandemic relief toward hiring new staff and other recurring expenses—in some cases requiring layoffs. For example, the Santa Ana Unified School District, in California, used ESSER to hire 400 additional employees. The district has announced several hundred layoffs this year. 

Santa Ana is the 19th largest district in California, with 38,000 students. 

According to Georgetown University’s Marguerite Roza, “districts added well over 200,000 positions between 2019-20 and 2023-24. Notably, 65% of the added positions are non-teaching roles of administrators, coordinators, counselors, interventionists, coaches, and student support staff.” You can listen to Ballotpedia’s May 28 On the Ballot interview with Roza about ESSER and the fiscal challenges facing school districts.

Ballotpedia’s new resource on ESSER funds details the total amount of funding each state and individual school districts received. Data comes from Georgetown University’s Edunomics Lab. Click here to dive into the details on your state.

San Tan Valley, Arizona, voters to decide whether to incorporate a new 100,000-person town on Aug. 5

On Aug. 5, Voters in San Tan Valley, Arizona, an unincorporated area of Pinal County, will decide on Proposition 495, which would incorporate the town.

Daily Brew readers may recall that, earlier this year, we covered a similar initiative in Cameron County, Texas, establishing the city of Starbase. Starbase is a community of about 500 residents and the home of SpaceX, the American space technology corporation that Elon Musk founded in 2002. Voters approved it with 97.3% of the vote. (See our coverage of that measure in our Feb. 26 and May 7 editions of the Brew.)

In 2024, Ballotpedia covered two other local ballot measures that created new municipalities. The first  created the city of Mountain House in San Joaquin County, California, and the other created the city of Mulberry in Gwinnett County, Georgia. Voters approved the measure in California 90.8%-9.2%. The measure in Georgia was approved 57%-43%.

San Tan Valley is located southwest of the Phoenix metropolitan area, between the towns of Queen Creek and Florence, with a population exceeding 100,000 residents. If the measure is approved, San Tan Valley would become the 92nd incorporated municipality in Arizona.

Several attempts have been made to incorporate the town previously. The first attempt, which proposed the name of San Tan, was in 2004. Before 2022, incorporation proposals required approval from towns within six miles of the proposed municipality. The town council of Florence, located southwest of San Tan Valley, vetoed attempts to incorporate the town in 2004 and 2010. The Pinal County Board of Supervisors rejected a 2018 attempt due to a defective petition application. 

In 2022, then-Gov. Doug Ducey (R) signed House Bill 2455, which modified the process for municipal incorporation in Arizona. The law removed the authority of most external entities to veto incorporation efforts.

Due to these changes to state law, only Gilbert and Mesa, as the largest cities neighboring San Tan Valley, were required to approve the petition for Proposition 495. The Gilbert City Council unanimously passed a resolution granting approval on Aug. 6, 2024. On Aug. 19, the Mesa City Council unanimously approved a resolution.

Multiple city leaders in the Phoenix metro area, including Chandler Mayor Kevin Hartke and Queen Creek Mayor Julia Wheatley, support the incorporation initiative.

San Tan Valley Inc. is the committee leading the campaign supporting the initiative. Their campaign website states, “San Tan Valley pays taxes that fund other communities and we lack proper representation. Incorporation brings our tax money to fund our neighborhoods and roads. It gives us a fully local representation.”

Former Phoenix City Councilmember Sal DiCiccio supports the initiative to incorporate the town. He said, “As someone who has fought for transparency and fiscal responsibility in Phoenix, I can tell you this: it makes zero sense for San Tan Valley residents to send over $10 Million of their tax dollars every year to a city that’s miles away and doesn’t represent them. That money should be building your roads, your parks, and your families – not funding the politics and priorities of Phoenix. It’s time for San Tan Valley to invest in itself.”

Ballotpedia has not identified a campaign against the initiative. However, some residents of San Tan Valley voiced opposition to the town’s incorporation. Gary Rhein, a resident of San Tan Valley, said, “I need to know [if]… my cost of living is going to go up if we incorporate versus what I’m paying now.”

Only voters living in the proposed San Tan Valley boundaries may vote in the Aug. 5 election. 

Click here to read more about Proposition 495. 

Did you know that voters decided an average of 33 statewide ballot measures during odd-numbered years between 2011 and 2023?

That number includes both initiated and referred measures. Initiated measures come from citizens, who try to collect the required number of signatures to place them on the ballot. Legislators are the driving force behind referred measures. They vote to refer measures to the ballot for voters to approve or reject. 

This year, election officials have certified 29 statewide ballot measures, slightly below the average since 2011. That number could still increase in the coming months. 

Click here to learn more about this year’s ballot measures.