Broward County School Board Member Adam Cervera has called on state officials to conduct “a full scale review” of the district’s finances, following Governor Ron DeSantis’s characterization of the sixth-largest school district in the country as a “disaster” and his suggestion that a state takeover may be necessary.
“We need transparency, we need accountability and we need to have the confidence that this mismanagement will not be ignored or swept under the rug,” Cervera told reporters Tuesday, briefly stepping away from a school board workshop.
On Monday, Gov. DeSantis, who appointed Cervera to the board, criticized the district for being run to benefit “the entrenched interests, particularly the school unions, rather than the parents and the students,” and said the state should consider taking control to correct what he described as budget mismanagement.
Cervera pointed to a series of recent financial missteps that have come to light, including a sudden withdrawal from an office-space lease worth nearly $3 million that resulted in a lawsuit, misallocated teacher referendum funds, and a “botched multimillion-dollar procurement process” intended to select an entity to oversee construction projects.
“This crisis is not the result of bad luck. This is the result of years of mismanagement, wasteful spending, and a complete lack of proper oversight and it has only gotten worse in just the past few months,” Cervera said. “We’ve seen scandal after scandal.”
He urged state officials, including Florida’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) team and the chief financial officer, to review the district’s finances. He also warned district staff involved in wrongdoing:
“If you are doing something wrong, I’m going to call for your ouster… Nobody is safe in this building. We are going to fix this problem now.”
School Board Chair Sarah Leonardi defended the district, saying it is inaccurate to call the district “a disaster.”
“No one here is denying the fact that we’ve had a chaotic history over the last few years,” Leonardi said. “While there are certain operational issues that’ll come up in any large organization, I think we, as Broward schools, have really turned a page.”
Leonardi highlighted that for the second year in a row, Broward schools received an A grade from the Florida Department of Education and reported no D- or F-rated schools.
“I welcome the governor and his team to work collaboratively with us to find those inefficiencies and fix them so that we’re spending taxpayer dollars as best as possible to deliver outcomes for students,” she said.
The district is currently facing a nearly $100 million budget gap due to declining enrollment, with approximately 10,000 fewer students than last year. Broward County Public Schools projects that over the next five years, it could lose more than 25,000 students. To address the shortfall, the board plans to vote on January 21 on proposals to close four elementary, two middle, and one high school, along with potential boundary adjustments in Pembroke Pines, Miramar, Hallandale, and Fort Lauderdale.
The closures are part of the multi-phase plan called “Redefining Our Schools,” which also includes adding new programs, combining schools, and repurposing school sites.
“It’s been 10 years in the making,” Superintendent Howard Hepburn said Tuesday in response to the governor’s comments. “This has not been addressed, unfortunately. We have an opportunity to correct the path for the future for students and for the citizens of Broward County.”
He added, “We are taking disciplined action to ensure financial stability, academic excellence, and accountability.”
