By Maureen Magee
7:35 p.m., June 28, 2011
Amid confusion over the state’s finances, the San Diego school board on Tuesday adopted a $1.04 billion budget — a grim spending plan that calls for the elimination of more than 750 teaching jobs, and 600 other positions.
The budget — and its $114 million in cost-cutting measures — will go into affect on Friday, kicking off the fiscal year and lean times for the San Diego Unified School District.
Teachers, parents and students showed up at the board meeting to wage last-ditch protests over cuts to busing, increases to class size, the elimination of teachers, and the suspension of favorite classroom programs.
Superintendent Bill Kowba lamented the state’s fiscal crisis, which he blamed for the district’s deep cuts. The budget was adopted as the state prepares to adopt its budget.
“All were looking for was a little certainty from Sacramento,” Kowba said. “And at every turn of the road, we get more uncertainty. We’re still not exactly sure what Sacramento is doing and how it will affect us.”
The school board voted 4-1 to adopt the 2011-12 budget and a rough plan for balancing the budget in the 2012-13 school year. Trustee Kevin Beiser voted no, saying the budget package paves the way for higher class sizes and cuts to public safety programs, music and art education in the 2012-2013 year.
This is the fourth straight year the district has been forced to make severe budget cuts to cope with reductions in state education funding. But this is the first time in recent memory that San Diego Unified teachers have been formally laid off.
In 2010, more than 110 pink slips were sent to teachers only to be rescinded three months later when furlough days saved their jobs. In 2009, nearly 600 faculty and staff members took advantage of an early retirement incentive, saving the district from massive layoffs. In 2008, the district issued pinks slips to more than 900 teachers, only to cancel almost all of them with unexpected state funding.
The San Diego teachers union dismissed a proposal in the spring that would have saved jobs by postponing negotiated pay raises, saying the plan undermines the concessions that some 7,000 educators already agreed to — including furlough days.
In addition to personnel cuts, the new district budget would: eliminate popular student seminars that send students to Old Town, Balboa Park and Camp Palomar; cancel bus routes to magnet schools and other campuses; raise class size from 24 to about 30 students in kindergarten, second- and third-grades (only first-grade classes will maintain 24-student classes). And although elementary schools will keep their instrumental music lessons next year, middle and high school art and music programs will be left to the whim of principals.
The district central office took a 14 percent hit in the budget. The number of area superintendents overseeing schools will drop from eight to six.
The board last week approved plans to cancel some 400 teacher layoffs should legislators approve a state budget that gives the district $36 million in revenue. But since the state budget is likely to include trigger cuts that could prompt midyear funding reductions if anticipated revenues don’t materialize, the district is uncertain whether it could rescind layoffs since it cannot terminate teachers halfway into the school year.
School board trustees are expected to meet on July 12 to discuss whether the state budget would allow them to start restoring budget cuts.
Heather Polen, a third-grade teacher at Johnson Elementary School, is hopeful her job could be saved. But just in case, she took on a second job waitressing.
“This has been the most stressful time. I am in constant fear because I won’t have a paycheck in 25 days,” said Polen, who teaches at a year-round campus. “But I am still teaching. I will look my students in the face and stay positive for as long as I can.”
Board Vice President John Lee Evans sympathized with Polen and the hundreds of other teachers who have been laid off.
“This is a crazy situation where we pass a budget before the state has told us definitively how much money we will get,” he said. “We are all very aware this (budget) is going to cause great damage to our district. But we are not going to give up on July 1st.”
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