The district handled the first wave of cuts without affecting classrooms.
Then, it absorbed much of December’s Education Finance Act cut of $1.4 million, “due partly to the fact that (the) board made the very wise decision to add $300,000 in a contingency fund,“ said Chief Financial Officer Susan Dowd. A contingency fund is money tucked away in case of budget amendments.
But now personnel is on the line.
“There’s no other place that you’re going to go to get the significant dollars other than personnel,“ said Superintendent Bennie Bennett.
Dowd said 85 percent of the district’s budget goes to salary and fringe benefits for personnel.
To blunt the blow of the budget cuts, the district, as well as statewide groups, have a few ideas.
WHAT MAY HELP SOME...
At the state level, legislators will soon hear the first proposals from a group made up of the State Board of Education, the South Carolina Association of School Administrators, or SCASA, and a circle of superintendents from across the state, of which Bennett is a member.
That list asks for changes in what the state requires. Larger class size (less teachers equals less expense), furloughs and less testing are among the items requested.
On the local level, Dowd reported quite a feat for the district.
The district is looking at expenses of approximately $305,000 more for the next school year, and with close to $3 million less to pull from, she said.
Therefore, the Newberry district also has suggestions for the upcoming 2009-2010 school year if budget cuts continue:
• a five-day furlough for all staff employed in the district more than 190 days
• increased class sizes and reduction of full-time teachers
“Hopefully,“ said Dowd, “this would be accomplished through attrition” and no one would be laid off.
• a hiring freeze of any current position vacancies
• elimination of the district’s “contingency budget,“ or money tucked away for unexpected cuts and needs
• an assessment of all purchase-service contracts
• suspension of additional national board certified supplements of $2,500
• an assessment of all other monetary supplements
• continuance of the 10 percent cuts to all school-based budgets for supplies and travel.
The part about increased class sizes hit several board members hard when they received the suggestions at Monday’s board meeting.
...MAY HURT OTHERS
“I would think the last on the list would be increasing class sizes,“ said Board Chairman Don Saylor.
Dowd though, did not give the answer Saylor was expecting.
“Because 85 percent of our budget is salary and fringe,“ she said, “looking at positions is going to have to be one of the top things that we look at. It’s not that we want to, but 15 percent of our budget is not going to get us to where we need to be.“
“This (budget) is as difficult as I’ve ever seen,“ Bennett added. “There will be some tough decisions that we’re going to have to make... that will affect personnel.“
Still, the news was hard to take for some.
“So basically, to get the most dollars that we’re going to need to balance our budget, the only way to do that will be the most harmful thing that we can do to the children we’re trying to educate,“ said board member Lucy Anne Meetze, “But we’re not going to have a choice.“
Board member Ike Bledsoe didn’t seem satisfied with the list though, and asked for additional options. He mentioned hearing of widespread job cuts on Monday alone, and said the district has not yet seen the bottom of the budget issues.
“I think we need to have a much worse plan in place of everything we’ve covered,“ said Bledsoe.
Bledsoe then shifted focus from teacher cuts to district administration cuts beyond a five-day furlough.
“I don’t see anything in there about—and I know this is a real unpopular place to say this—about administration. I think that’s where the big money is going to come from,“ he said. “There’s going to have to be considerable cuts in that area even before the classroom.“
The five-day furlough is “just a drop in the bucket,“ he said.
But Bennett assured the board that the ax would strike administration first.
“You can bet that if we start cutting classroom teachers, it will start with this administration,“ Bennett said. “We wouldn’t dare try to do that without touching administration.“
At the meeting, district officials also got the OK from the board use up to $1.6 million of the fund balance to absorb current reductions. The allowance would not transgress the district’s policy to keep a minimum of 10 percent of the current year’s operating budget in the fund balance.
Currently, the district has $8.6 million in its fund balance, and has an operating budget of about $45 million.
STATEWIDE MEASURES TO COPE WITH CUTS
Education representatives from around state including SCASA, the State Department of Education and a superintendents’ group, are going to the legislature this week with proposals that they think will help the current budget situation.
Dowd described these items as “temporary measures“ that “won’t necessarily happen“ that first need legislative action before they can be put in place next year.
The proposals with local commentary:
• flexibility to be able to take funds that were appropriated for a specific category and maybe use it in a different area.
That flexibility would hopefully trickle down to the local district level, said Dowd.
• suspension of professional staffing ratios, so schools wouldn’t be required to maintain a 25:1 student-teacher ratio.
“You could have 26-to-1 or 27-to-1,“ said Dowd. (The state mandates student-teacher ratios)
• a delay in the day teacher contracts must be signed from April 15 to May 15
• additional language to be able to furlough teachers up to five non-instructional days.
Dowd estimates that a teacher furlough of that manner would save the district $500,000.
“We currently have 10 non-instructional days built into a teacher contract, and right now, based on the language, we cannot go below the 190-day contract for teachers,“ she said.
• suspension of implementation of formative assessments for grades 1 through 5
• suspension of foreign language and PE assessments
• suspension of text book adoption
• permission to negotiate “active retiree” and Teacher and Employee Retention Incentive or “TERI salaries”
“Right now for professional contracts, you cannot negotiate that,“ said Dowd.
Bennett on the
recommendations:
“A lot of roundtable meetings...over the last month or so, not only at the state level but also in our consortium, was trying to find those things that we can live with across the board,“ he said.
“These things are actually going to require legislative action and without that, it doesn’t make a lot of difference what we do locally if we don’t get some assistance of what we can do differently from the state level.“
Bennett said other requests may come up like suspension of any assessment that’s not required by the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
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