To the Editor:
Most families try very hard to live within their means, and budget accordingly. They have an idea about their utility costs, their rent or mortgage payment, food, telephone, and cable. Children “cost” too, as they need clothes, medical and dental care. Many parents also try to provide and pay for dance lessons, skates for hockey, club memberships, bikes, cell phones, etc…and the list can be endless, can’t it? It seems as though there is nothing a parent would not try or do, when it comes to children. If something happens however, where their money is cut or is significantly reduced, families have to take a good hard look at where they are spending, and make a change. When these changes affect children, it makes cutting back so much harder. Relying on “credit” will not solve the problem, in fact down the road, using credit and borrowing could make things worse.
The State of Michigan cut school districts by $165 per student in funding for THIS school year. The Escanaba Area Public School family is required to end the year with a balanced budget, and so five months into the school year, it now must make cuts to address a $447,409 shortfall.The Board of Education directed me to pull together our administrative team to identify exactly what is possible to cut, given that employee contracts are already in place. The team looked at EVERYTHING, and spent many hours on the task. Ideas were listed, evaluated as to their impact on student achievement, their impact on opportunities for students, as well as how the cuts might affect parents and our community. By the time we finished, we had a list of items that we put into five categories: 1) Instructional support and resources, 2) Administrative, 3) Extra-curricular, 4) Facilities, and 5) Transportation. An additional item was added in (but subject to bargaining with the teacher’s union) to end up with a list of cuts totaling $439,590. (Please note: this figure is $4,000 more than first calculated and communicated.)
The Board of Education Finance Committee met on Thursday, November 19, and reviewed the list at an open meeting. A great deal of information was presented, and so consequently, some of this information was not accurately captured by the Daily Press. I have been granted this opportunity by the newspaper to share the proposed cuts through this editorial.
In the area of Instructional Supports and Resources, cuts equating to $131,000 were accomplished by reducing hours of support personnel, as well as reducing instructional and technology supplies.
Administrative Cuts totaled $127,217. The administrators and the district technology staff offered to take a pay freeze, and I offered to work two days of my contract without pay. Secondly, the activities/athletics secretarial position was eliminated. Finally, through the grappling of “how to cut without impacting students”, the team figured out that the district could use fund transfers from both the hot lunch and some of the federal programs to account for additional time and utilities.
Extra-curricular cuts amounted to $77,087. The cuts in this category are spread out in four areas. Of that total, $37,000 will come from instituting a “pay-to-ride” program for our extra-curricular sports, fine arts, and clubs. In addition, $30,240 will come from cutting some sports (H.S. girls’ gymnastics and boys’ tennis; M.S. track, ticket manager position, and by paying for M.S. volleyball and cheerleading out of the M.S. fund-raising pot). In the area of fine arts, a savings of $7,659 is achieved by cutting the extra-duty pay of our music instructors for non-classroom time. One middle school activity (student council) will be self-funded and two high school clubs (E-club and Chess Club) will be cut, for a savings of $2,188.
Facilities will see a cut of $54,200. $44,000 of this amount is a result of reducing custodial time by 12 hours. Reducing the costs of utilities (eliminating personal refrigerators, extra vending machines from schools, and heat for Washington School) is expected to render $8,200 of savings. Using up what we have for custodial supplies and not buying “new” will save $2,000. Transportation will eliminate monthly training meetings, which saves $2500.
Eliminating five days of school for students, while adding 16-18 minutes to the remaining days in the 2009-2010 school calendar will save $47,586 and also allow the district to designate 2 of these days for state-mandated professional development.
In summary, the Board will vote Monday evening on whether or not to cut spending by $439,590 in order to address the State’s $165 per pupil cut to this year’s state aid payment. They will vote, knowing that the district still has a good possibility of ANOTHER cut of $127 per pupil by January 2010; and ANOTHER cut for next school year that is anticipated to be between $600 (1.6 million) and $1000 (2.7 million) per student. We all will pray for a miracle—that we won’t see such a cut. However, if you know you can do something to prepare for a “hurricane”, you start boarding up your windows. Thinking it might “miss you” does not help you one bit once the wind starts blowing.
Like a family facing a significant financial shortfall, we need to pull together as we make these extremely difficult decisions. It expected that Michigan will recover slowly, and these hard times may not be resolved for several years. In the meantime, we still have students to teach, to inspire, and to provide for as much as we are able, given our financial challenges. We need to act now, and in ways we have never had to before, because these are days that we have never seen the likes of before. I know that if any community can rally and rise above all this, it is Escanaba. I think with a committed community, we can meet this challenge. Like never before, your school system needs you. Most importantly, our children need you. Thank you.