After two decades of steady growth and financial stability in the Rio Rancho Public Schools, New Mexico's fastest-growing school district found itself face to face with a $3.8 million budget deficit going into the 2008-09 school year. Because people in the district hesitated to change anything that would cut into student programming, and nobody wanted to resort to teacher and staff layoffs, the operations team in Rio Rancho proposed a battery of spending cuts, savings strategies and cultural changes. Today, Rio Rancho Public Schools forecast a nearly balanced budget for the first time in five years. For the 2010-11 school year, the cash balance had grown to more than $8.9 million despite state budget cuts. The plan for 2011-12 was to use some of the cash balance to help sustain programs and avoid personnel cuts. The school district has been able to accomplish that while maintaining a quality education program. In this article, the author shares three takeaways from the painful turnaround of fortunes in a community accustomed to years of steady growth and financial stability.