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Palo Alto Online

District looks at deeper budget cuts

by Grace Rauh

A day after the school district approved $3.5 million in budget cuts, officials learned they would have to cut an additional $1 million to $1.5 million.

The state budget announced by Gov. Gray Davis Wednesday did not include his proposal to divert property tax revenues from basic-aid districts, but did slice categorical state dollars used to fund specific school programs.

Rather than proposing further cuts to compensate for the additional state funding reductions, Superintendent Mary Frances Callan is hopeful an increase in property tax revenue next year will offset any decrease.

Despite this latest shortfall, Callan said the state's budget hits all school districts equally. "This is taking our fair share, yes. It is equivalent to what other districts across the state are doing," Callan said.

Fair share or not, many in the district are already displeased with the cost-cutting process. On Tuesday, school board members approved 58 line-item cuts that sliced several non-teacher positions, shrank athletics funding, increased counselor to student ratios, shifted teachers on special assignments and reduced funding for programs like AVID and GATE.

Next to go are nearly 17 full-time classified positions, slated for the May 27 chopping block. The discussion to cut classified employees followed the district's approval of a "Classified School Employees Week" to be held from May 18 to 24.

The Palo Alto Educators Association (PAEA) spoke out against the cuts at the Tuesday meeting and complained their input was excluded from the budget drafting.

An expected rise in health and welfare benefits rates coupled with the loss of two or three staff development days may cut teachers' total incomes by 1.2 percent to more than 10 percent next year.

The union fears local schools will become teaching grounds and drive away educators unable to resolve rising living costs with shrinking incomes.

"We weren't really involved in the list of reductions," said Palo Alto High School math teacher Suzanne Antink. "We had one meeting with the superintendent before proposed reductions and she ran the list with us, which I thought was polite, but it wasn't for input."

Callan felt the budget cuts did reflect teacher and classified staff input.

"I was somewhat surprised," Callan said of the union's disappointment. "I do believe we did have an opportunity for input and dialogue. I regret that they do not believe these reflect the issues they had."

"My understanding was that by not doing pink slips and not doing class-size reduction we were doing what the teachers requested," school board president Mandy Lowell said.

Concessions to teachers will not protect them from considerable increases in health and welfare benefits. Kaiser rates are expected to increase by 20 percent next year and Blue Cross rates by 25 percent, according to the district's Joint Benefits Committee data as cited in a recent PAEA memo.

The district's $12 million reserves should be invested in employees and used to absorb benefits costs, according to the PAEA.

"I don't want to spend it all, but I want to create a cushion for a year," Antink said.

"This is somewhat premature," said Callan, who won't have hard benefits data until June 15. A committee is already meeting to analyze the increases in health plan costs.

"The district isn't in active negations with the union right now. We haven't formulated a proposal on salary and benefits. We were waiting to see what the committee comes up with," Lowell said.

Grace Rauh can be e-mailed at grauh@paweekly.com