An unexpected revenue windfall is giving Prince William County’s school board a bit more flexibility as it sets its new budget, opening the door to the addition of a substantial raise for teachers and other school staff.

Superintendent Steven Walts presented a revised version of the fiscal 2018 budget at a March 8 “markup” session, the board’s last chance to make substantial changes to its new spending plan before taking a final vote at its March 15 meeting. In a turn of events Walts confessed he hasn’t witnessed in his last decade with the school division, he said the board now has an extra $6.8 million or so to work with, thanks to a bump in federal, state and county revenue.

That sudden change meant that Walts was able to satisfy the demands of several school board members and division staffers and add an extra $6 million to provide a more substantial raises for school employees. He had originally proposed spending more than $14 million to simply give staff a 2 percent pay raise, but the revenue boost means the school division can now offer a “step increase,” moving employees up the salary scale commensurate with their experience.

Walts also proposed using that money to raise the maximum salary for staff at the top of the “step” scale, and eliminate the lowest rung on the ladder to boost minimum salaries.

In all, the changes sailed through with little debate, and after adding a few tweaks of their own, board members approved a preliminary version of the budget on a 7-1 straw vote. Willie Deutsch of the Coles District cast the dissenting vote.

In an interview after the meeting, Riley O’Casey — the president of the Prince William Education Association — said she was surprised to see the step increase make it into the budget so easily. But she credits the work of her group’s members in speaking out at recent meetings for helping persuade the board to embrace the change, which works out to an average 2.8 percent pay raise.

“It’s just phenomenal,” O’Casey said. “Especially removing the step at the bottom, teachers needed that the most. The new ones just aren’t making as much, and that’s really going to help with recruitment.”

But the revised budget does more than just address employee pay — it includes several key changes to the division’s school construction plans.

With Prince William County including more than $900,000 in its proposed budget to cover debt service costs for the construction of a higher capacity 13th high school in Bristow, Walts decided to move ahead with the controversial arrangement brokered by the two boards that would give the school division $10.6 million to spend on both the high school’s construction and class-size reduction on the east end of the county.

Accordingly, Walts decided to direct $7.9 million of the $10.6 million set aside for east-end school construction to purchase land for the elementary school set to be built off Prince William Parkway in Woodbridge.

But Vice Chair Lillie Jessie of the Occoquan District made a motion to direct those funds instead to speeding up the construction of a new elementary school in the Cherry Hill area. The school division has yet to purchase land for that building, and staff expects it will cost anywhere from $3 million to $5 million to do so.

“I really want to see this money go to the neediest area in that corridor,” Jessie said.

Yet Dave Cline, the school division’s associate superintendent for finance and support services, cautioned that the board might be better served to “use the cash now while we have it” and make an immediate impact on a project poised to move forward right away. Deutsch agreed, and pointed out that spending this money now will free up funds the division planned to borrow for the Parkway site to go to the Cherry Hill project instead, once the division finds a parcel of land for the facility.

Jessie ultimately relented, and the board included the Parkway spending in the budget.

Justin Wilk of the Potomac District made a motion to speed up the process for the Cherry Hill school, suggesting that the board agree to buy the land for the building in 2018 instead of 2019.

Loree Williams of the Woodbridge District agreed, and added a condition — she wants the division to accelerate the construction of an “Occoquan-Woodbridge” elementary school as well, targeting 2019 for the acquisition of land for the project in place of 2020.

Though Cline warned that change could strain the school’s debt limit in 2019, the board still advanced Wilk and Williams’ proposals. Alyson Satterwhite of the Gainesville District provided the lone dissenting vote, while acting member Shawn Brann of the Brentsville District abstained.

But even these changes left Jessie feeling unsatisfied with the board’s commitment to alleviating overcrowding in elementary schools on the eastern end of Prince William.

“What’re our plans to expedite the process to get kids out of trailers?” Jessie said. “I don’t see a discussion of anything in the budget. I need a plan, and I need a plan for my community.”

Cline and Walts pointed to the superintendent’s “supplemental budget,” which identifies the hundreds of millions the division would need to move every student into a permanent classroom, as something county supervisors can consider as they set the school system’s budget. But Williams noted that document is only a suggestion, not a formal budget request, and she would rather see a bolder statement about what the school division needs.

“I, frankly, don’t want to stand in front of the board of supervisors and present a budget that doesn’t solve the problem of trailers on the east end,” Williams said.

The board is set to take a final vote on the budget March 15, then present that funding request to supervisors on March 28.