Publication Date: Friday, March 12, 2004
School district cuts 11 teachers, staff positions
School district cuts 11 teachers, staff positions
(March 12, 2004) Board approves non-teaching furlough days to help slash $2.7 million from next year's budget, despite major fund-raising effort
by Rachel Metz
Palo Alto school district employees, except teachers, will take two unpaid days off next year as part of $2.7 million in budget cuts, the school board voted on Tuesday night.
The cuts are to help fill a $4.2 million hole in next year's budget -- $1.5 million of which the district hopes to fill through fund-raising efforts.
As reported in early March, several teachers and two high school vice principals are among nearly 20 people who will either retire and have their positions unfilled, be let go or re-assigned, according to Marilyn Cook, the district's director of human resources. The board ratified the cuts Tuesday night, indicating efforts will be made to find different jobs for the affected individuals.
The two non-teacher furlough days will reduce the district's costs by approximately $199,000, saving several district clerk positions. Several programs, including some high-school athletics and the Spectra Art program, will also be cut back.
The district's shortfall is a result of lower-than-expected growth in property-tax revenues, increases in employee-benefit costs, increases in student enrollment and news in mid-February that the district must pay an additional $250,000 to the state's Public Employee Retirement System.
Though the district's shortfall is large -- especially when combined with last year's cuts of about $4 million to its $105 million annual budget -- it's not faring as badly as some others in the area. In cash-strapped west Contra Costa County, the school board recently voted to close district libraries, eliminate the elementary school music program and high school sports programs as part of an effort to save $16.5 million.
Chuck McDonnell, president of the local classified employees union -- which represents many employees like landscapers and custodians -- thanked administrators Tuesday night for standing alongside blue-collar employees in taking furlough days.
Classified staff "overwhelmingly supported" the days, which were ratified in a meeting Monday night by a 95 percent vote in the largest turnout in the union's history, McDonnell said.
He said "old-timers" -- classified employees with 15 years or more of service -- were the heartiest supporters of the furloughs.
"They were the most driven and vocal about the need to save all jobs," he said.
Tuesday's vote was also necessary to meet a state-mandated March 15 deadline for notifying any teachers who might be laid off as a result of reductions.
Marilyn Cook, head of human resources for the district, said at the March 3 meeting that the district will try to re-assign as many employees as possible. Last year, the district reduced about 17 positions and only two employees did not return this year. Those employees took jobs elsewhere, Cook said.
School board members Tuesday said repeatedly they were unhappy about making cuts but felt they needed to pass all reductions before them.
"We're not going to find any more money if we debate longer," board member Mandy Lowell said.
But Ro Davis, president of the Palo Alto Educators Association, which represents district teachers, disagreed. He appealed to the board to pass cuts only relating to meeting the March 15 notification deadline but to wait another two months to approve the rest.
"Without arbitrary deadlines we may find workable solutions over the next eight weeks," Davis said.
The district held a number of community meetings before making the cuts, but no really different ideas came forth after the first five meetings, Lowell said. She said holding more meetings would just incur additional hand-wringing.
But there may be some hope on the horizon. Between now and early May the district will continue to look at other ways to save money, and district officials are hopeful the state will provide more funding or that local property-tax revenue growth will increase, Superintendent Mary Frances Callan said.
Board member Gail Price didn't sound as hopeful, saying trustees anticipate there will be more cuts in the next year or so unless they find new solutions to the underlying finance problem.
"We are facing issues and modifications we have, to date, not had to do," she said.
One possible solution is that the district will see a portion of its cuts covered by combined efforts of fund-raising groups -- the All Schools Fund and the Palo Alto Foundation for Education. The board Tuesday approved the groups' efforts to raise $1.5 million, which will be covered by district reserves until the groups can pay it back.
Rachel Metz can be e-mailed at rmetz@paweekly.com
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