LTUSD slashes 7 positions from payroll
By Kathryn Reed
Seven positions were eliminated Tuesday night by Lake Tahoe Unified School District’s board of trustees.
Attrition and early retirements will account for most of the positions that won’t exist in the 2011-12 school year.
The surprise on March 1 was the elimination of the NRJOTC instructor. This had not been on the radar of the board during recent budget discussions, though there was an awareness the Navy would eventually cut its funding. With the Navy providing more than 50 percent of the salary, the district could not pick up the rest of the expense. The Navy nixed the program because it wants 10 percent of the student body to be in the program. South Tahoe High has eight students.
The other positions cut include:
• South Tahoe Middle School, 6th-grade teacher
• South Tahoe Middle School, teacher physical education
• STMS, counselor
• Independent Learning Academy, teacher
• Director of Human Resources/Staff Development
• Bilingual Coordinator
For this part of the meeting board members Mike Doyle and Judy Cefalu were absent. Doyle arrived late to the special meeting.
The three in attendance for the whole meeting – Wendy David, Sue Novasel and Larry Green – asked Superintendent Jim Tarwater to bring back a detailed version of what the reorganization of the district will look so they know who will be doing what job.
Questions were brought up about Sue O’Conner, who handles English learners, and what happens with her departure.
Human Resources Director Jim Watson said O’Connor will work a few hours to pay for her health benefits, so it’s not like the position is being eliminated altogether.
“Sue is not going away. She will be able to help us out,” Watson told the board.
CFO Deb Yates said with fewer people it will mean reprioritizing what needs to be done.
“When you talk about reorganization, you look at the duties and pass them out to the administrative team because there is no one else to do it,” Superintendent Jim Tarwater said.
It’s expected the district’s attorney will be in town once a week to handle legal issues that had been handled in house before.
Lake Tahoe Unified needed to cut the positions based on declining enrollment and the threat from the state to keep taking away money. If the June ballot measure does not pass, the ledger will be an even darker shade of red.
In an effort to show its support for the measure, the board passed a resolution Tuesday night in support of continuing with the tax structure that is in place.
Lake Tahoe Unified is not alone in downsizing. Predictions are this will be a record year for teacher pink slips. About 30,000 teachers in California are expected to be notified by the March 15 deadline that their services are not needed for the next school year. This is an increase of nearly 10,000 from a year ago.
If the June ballot measure fails, it will be a $2 billion hit for public schools or $330 for each of the state’s 6 million students. What it will mean for LTUSD is more cuts to people, plus the likely elimination of programs such as class-size reduction, music and physical education starting in 2012-13.
Sounds like everyone is doing the same thing, joining the rest of the world who has been doing cut backs for 3 years now. Maybe if all the government workers took pay cuts or got on board with changing how they work sooner they wouldn’t be putting more on the unemployment lines now. If it’s the unions killing the jobs , maybe Wisconsin has it right.
It’s not just unions killing jobs – it’s also government-imposed work rules that the unions’ democratic friends put in place. U.S businesses would be much more competitive if the government did not require overtime pay after 40 hours, got rid of the minimum wage, permitted children to work full time, abolished Social Security and Medicare, and repealed workplace safety regulations and workman’s compensation. Then we could get back those jobs that moved to more business-friendly countries such as Vietnam and Bangladesh.
Addressing Frank’s comments:
The school district has been cutting jobs and programs for over 10 years, long before the current economic crisis. As our area became a second home community starting in the 1990’s, the schools lost student enrollment and so, naturally, had to make cuts. (Districts receive most of their funding from the State based on student attendance.) While it is necessary, it is wrenching to the entire staff to go through this process every year, and they have been doing it for over a decade. And there have been major funding adjustments. The district capped what it pays for benefits around 2003, way ahead of most entities. The individual staff member now pays for the increasing costs involved. Many worthwhile programs and positions have been cut. NJROTC has been an outstanding program with an especially qualified instrutor. While working with students of wide ranging abilities, it sets high standards and presents life skills that will hold those students in good stead the rest of their lives. (Was this program a casualty of the still controversial scheduling currently in place at the high school?)
It may be worth noting that District personnel are salaried, and therefore pay taxes on every dollar earned. No place to hide from the IRS. As we lose these people, and other government employees, we lose fully taxed community members.
(I am not employed by, nor is any family member employed by the school district or other government agency.)
Tarwater is cutting Sue O’connor’s job to save money. However Sue will work a few hours to pay for her health benefits.
According to the City Budget the cost of health benefits is $18,500 per employee.
Does the School District have less expensive plan.
Ann, Well informed statement. At least you have some facts to back your message unlike those who just throw out comments with no real knowledge of what has been going on for years!