Potential cuts would include six teachers and more than five nursing positions.
By Knowles Adkisson / The Malibu Times
In an effort to prepare for a worst-case budget scenario for the next school year, the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District (SMMUSD) Board of Education at its board meeting Feb. 17 voted 5-1 to authorize district staff to prepare layoff notices for six teaching positions and 5.6 (five full-time and one part-time) nursing positions.
District staff will present the board with specific candidates for layoffs at its next meeting on March 3, based on seniority. Debra Moore Washington, the district’s assistant superintendent for human resources, said the proposed teacher cuts were taken “out of an abundance of caution” and the nursing positions “to engender some flexibility for the district and its programs.”
Washington was quick to stress that this resolution does not necessarily mean there will be layoffs. School districts are required by law to notify employees they might be laid off by Mar. 15 for the following school year, but they can rescind those notices until May. District staff is waiting to see how much funding it will receive from the state for the next school year, whether it will have to absorb any staff from Point Dume Marine Science Elementary School if it achieves charter status and the effects of an anticipated drop in kindergarten enrollment. If staff feels better about the budget outlook by May, it could rescind some or all of the layoff notices.
Board member Laurie Lieberman voted with the majority to authorize the notices.
“I support this even though it’s certainly not an easy decision, and it’s not a final decision,” she said.
Board member Ralph Mechur, the lone dissenting vote (Board member Maria Leon-Vazquez was absent), believed the layoff notices would unnecessarily antagonize the staff.
“I understand the flexibility, but I do think that making these micro-adjustments does not begin to address what we might have to address,” Mechur said in reference to a worst-case scenario. “I think it’s just making specific targets, which is going to create some ill will, and I just want to let the community know as much as possible that our intention is to hold things steady for next year and take a breather, and pray that the Legislature and the voters allow us to do that.”
Most of the school district’s funding comes from the state government on a per student basis. That funding will be up in the air until July 1, when the state produces its budget for the 2011-12 fiscal year. Gov. Jerry Brown has proposed extending temporary income, vehicle and sales taxes. Those must be passed by a two-thirds majority in the Legislature and then approved by voters. If the tax extensions fail, school district CFO Jan Maez has predicted cuts ranging from $330 to $350 per student, which would total about $3.6 million, to a worst-case scenario of $1,000 per student.
Superintendent Tim Cuneo told the board he believed the district could weather anything up to the $350 per student cut.
“Anything greater than that… we believe that the Legislature will put into place opportunities for school districts then to have the flexibility to make adjustments in the school year staffing because of that huge hit,” Cuneo said.
The six teacher layoffs would likely come from teachers who are still completing their probationary service, or first two years of work, Washington said. The purpose for the nursing layoffs is more complicated. A health task force has been appointed by the board to study ways of providing better health service to students with the same amount of funding by exploring possible alternatives to fully salaried nurses. The task force has met once and is scheduled to meet three more times in March. Its findings will likely determine whether the nurses are retained or let go.
Tom Belin, a UCLA professor with a child at Lincoln Middle School in Santa Monica, spoke against replacing nurses with less-qualified positions such as health clerks and licensed vocational nurses.
“It matters that staff are qualified,” Belin told the board.
Whatever its findings, Board Vice President Ben Allen urged the task force to finish its study as soon as possible. “The last thing I want to have is folks dangling around not knowing what their status is for a long period of time. I think that’s unfair to our employees, I think it’s unfair to our district.”