Oakland Unified's school board approved a tentative budget this week that its president called the district's first balanced budget in 22 years. What she didn't mention: the two officials most responsible for building a credible plan to close a $102 million deficit were both gone by December — after the superintendent secretly drafted her own numbers without telling them.

The approval caps months of financial turmoil at OUSD, a district The Dissent has tracked since May, when it struck a teacher pay deal with no clear funding plan. What's now emerged is a fuller picture of how that plan materialized: through internal conflict, two contentious departures from the district's senior leadership, and a tentative budget that still requires $30 million in unidentified cuts to hold — all while the county watches with stated concerns about fiscal stability.

On Wednesday, the Oakland Unified School District board voted to approve its 2026-27 tentative budget, capping a year in which the district went from staring down a projected $102 million deficit to claiming something its leadership hadn't been able to say in more than two decades.

"To have a budget that's balanced for the first time in 22 years is something that we should be celebrating," board president Jennifer Brouhard told NBC Bay Area. "And it's a budget that kept us out of receivership."

That's a meaningful statement for a district that spent years under state oversight. But the math underneath the celebration is more complicated — and so is the process that produced it.

A Secret Budget, Two Departures

According to exclusive reporting by The Oaklandside, the most serious disruption to OUSD's budget process unfolded in a single week last December. Chief Business Officer Lisa Grant-Dawson and Chief of Staff Dan Bellino — the two senior officials who had spent weeks developing a plan to tackle the deficit — were both shown the door shortly after Superintendent Denise Saddler bypassed them entirely.

In early December, the senior leadership team had been grinding through the numbers together, holding sessions that ran from early morning into the evening. Then Saddler submitted to the board a budget proposal her own finance chief and chief of staff had never seen. The plan had been developed, she told a colleague in an email obtained by The Oaklandside, with the help of "outside assistance."

Grant-Dawson, who joined OUSD in 2020, said the disagreement was fundamental. "I just saw a shift in what I thought the board was going to be willing to do, as far as its operational and financial activity," she told The Oaklandside. "I don't want to be a part of that."

Bellino described the weeks before as relentless effort to hit the $100 million target while staying within parameters set by the board. "We had been struggling, struggling, struggling," he said.

Saddler did not respond to a request for comment from The Oaklandside.

The Numbers That Don't Quite Add Up

The tentative budget approved this week projects a $7.9 million balance while carrying a $30 million structural deficit — a combination that has left some board members and community groups confused.

"It's impossible to have a deficit and a surplus at the same time," board member Mike Hutchinson said at the board meeting.

Brouhard defended the approach, saying the district is leaning on reserve funds and has satisfied both state and board-adopted reserve requirements while remaining current on payroll. But the board still needs to identify $30 million in cuts before the budget becomes final — a figure that could shift depending on how California's own state budget shakes out.

That $30 million gap matters in context. The tentative budget includes the $32 million cost of teacher raises approved earlier this year — the deal The Dissent reported in May had no identified funding source at the time. Those raises are now in the budget. What's still missing is the plan to close what remains.

Transparency Concerns From the County and the NAACP

The Alameda County superintendent has formally raised concerns about the district's fiscal stability — and the state already rejected OUSD's appeal to overturn that county "concern" notice, according to prior Oaklandside reporting. Those flags remain on the books.

Oakland NAACP spokesperson and former school board member Jorge Lerma said the district still hasn't answered the basic question of what comes next. "We know that there are financial ways — taking from Paul to pay Peter and getting through the moment — but what we're asking, one, clear numbers and that there be a sustainability plan," he told NBC Bay Area. "We want to know what comes after this."

The Oaklandside separately noted that the district has been stonewalling a public records request seeking documentation of the December budget deliberations since January — more than six months — citing staffing shortages and scope concerns.

The board returns in August to work through the remaining cuts. Until then, the question OUSD's own finance chief was pushed out for asking — whether the numbers actually hold — remains open.