School district’s finances are setting off alarms

Heads up, taxpayers — and if you haven’t done this already, keep an eye on your Hamtramck Public School District.
There should be concern over the financial goings-on at the Hamtramck Public School District – an issue that residents in Birmingham experienced just a few years ago.
District Interim Superintendent James Larson-Shidler recently surprised Board of Education members when he suddenly announced that the district is facing payless paydays, unless an emergency $15.5 million loan is received.
But, the state turned down that loan request, and now the district is coming back to the state to ask for $13.3 million.
This reminds us of Larson-Shidler’s tenure in the Birmingham Public School District, where suddenly there was a $14 million budget deficit that Larson-Shidler came under fire for, which then led to his quick departure from the district.
A lot of finger-pointing ensued over who was at fault for Birmingham’s financial mess. Flash forward a few years, and Larson-Shidler landed a job in Hamtramck’s school district as finance director.
He now wears two hats, those of financial director and superintendent.
And now, it seems, Hamtramck is facing its Birmingham moment.
As you might expect, school board members were not pleased with the unexpected request to seek emergency payments.
Even more perplexing was that Larson-Shidler never told the board that he had been dipping into the district’s budget to cover costs for the past three months.
Did he think that the financial jam-up would magically disappear, and no one would have noticed it had existed?
More troubling was that, for the third year in a row, the district failed to meet a Nov. 1 deadline to submit its annual financial audit to state officials, which is what led to the state withholding financial support.
Considering that the interim superintendent is also the district’s finance director, this all becomes even more concerning.
It seems to us that, if the district were a private business and this kind of a financial situation were not immediately disclosed to higher-ups, some heads would roll.
Frankly, this situation begs the question: What else is not being disclosed to the board of education — and the public?
Posted Feb. 27, 2026