Scheduled pay increases survive school district budget cuts
Budget cover — The actual cover from the 2010-2011 preliminary budget. (CCSD)
Teacher and employee scheduled pay increases — called steps and lanes — passed in the Cache County School District preliminary budget for 2010-11. Teachers expressed strong opposition to a possible freeze of steps and lanes in the May 21 board meeting. Board members on several occasions also expressed a desire not to make cuts to teacher’s pay — and expected pay — unless they have no alternative. Tuesday evening the Cache School Board passed a budget that cut $3.47 million from expected expenses.
“We spent an awful lot of time on the budget,” said Superintendent Steven Norton when opening the budget discussion. “This is a tough year.”
“It’s been tough times for the last two or three years,” he added.
Norton expressed thanks to the employees, teachers, administrators, and board members for working together to create the budget. He also thanked the teacher and employee organizations for working with the district over changes in insurance, retirement and the budget cuts.
Student-to-teacher ratio increased
State and other revenue are down while growth expenses — including staffing two new elementary schools — increased. The school board had to make some hard choices.
One of these was raising the student-to-teacher ratio by 1.25 students.
The ratio change should save the district an estimated $1.35 million. However, it means that there will be no new teachers hired for the next school year even as the district staffs the new schools. Even with the hiring freeze it wouldn’t be enough to make the full $1.35 million savings. Instead, the board is banking on expected growth — which normally requires hiring new teachers — to make up the difference. With these changes the district will not be laying off any employees.
Of course there will be an extra student or two in most of the classes across the district.
Betting on the economy
Additionally, because the shortfall was so great, the board has decided to use the district’s “Undistributed Reserves” to cover the budget this year. They expect to spend $641,000 of these funds for staff development, textbooks, young mother’s program, transportation.
This is a one time expense from a fund that will not be available next year. The remaining fund balance is necessary to absorb mid-year changes mandated by the state or by district circumstances. The board is literally betting the economy will improve enough next year that further cuts won’t be necessary. If the economy does not improve and revenue is reduced again, much harder sacrifices are expected across the district.
School reserves
The board even looked at the fund balances, or carryover, of the individual schools. Each school has funds they carry from year to year. Tonight the board was presented with details of where those funds are from and what they are used for. For the most part, fund balances represent money earmarked for future use. These include grants, funds needed for routine maintenance, and even donations for specific uses.
For example, one school received $3,000 a year from PTA fundraisers — which they kept on their books as a fund balance — for the purchase of new playground equipment.
There was a discussion in the last school board meeting about asking for some of these fund balances back for use in the district. However, it became clear to the board tonight that these funds should be left alone for now.
Evening bus route cut
One of two evening bus routes for select schools were cut. The district has offered after hours bussing of students from several schools in the district to their homes. There were two routes — one starting at 4 p.m. and the other at 5:30 p.m. The board approved cutting all 4 p.m. after hours bussing and only keeping the 5:30 p.m. routes.
Activity transport fee
The district is seriously considering creating a transportation fee for all transportation to sporting and extra-curricular activities. Students in the different sports, band, debate and other programs would be expected to pay the fee.
Right now the district pays 100 percent of bussing to events. The district is proposing splitting the cost 80/20 with the schools. The schools would levy a fee to each student for each program they belong to. So if an athlete is on the football and basketball team they would have to pay the fee for both programs.
The initial fee was estimated to be $30 per student per program. However, there is doubt that $30 is enough. The board tabled the transportation fee so they can further study the issue.
Logan district boundaries
The Logan School District’s superintendent contacted Superintendent Norton to discuss the boundaries between the districts. In the past, any land annexed by Logan City would automatically be moved into the Logan School District. This is no longer the case.
Norton said that Logan is interested in the property development at Riverwoods which includes planned multi-family housing. He also said the bigger issue is the development around the Logan-Cache Airport.
“There is a process outlined by law,” said Norton about changing boundaries. “It isn’t the best written law. If you go through the process, you will have a mediator appointed by the state. Logan will probably pursue it all the way there.”
Norton said he wanted to alert the board that they will likely receive formal notification from Logan School District to move the land into their district.