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Hello everyone—
Now that California has a budget, our situation at the County Office
continues to clarify. There are still a lot of unknowns, but I want to bring
you up to date on the latest that we do know about how the state budget will
impact us.
- There is no COLA funding through the 2009-2010 budget year.
- There is no reduction in funding for After-School Education; Child
Development; Child Nutrition; Economic Impact Aid; Home-to-School
Transportation; K-3 Class Size Reduction; Quality Education Investment Act;
and Special Education.
- We're looking at a reduction in "revenue limit" funding—Fund 800 Support
Services, Fund 900 Instructional Support Services, Fund 920 Alternative
Schools-Community, and Fund 940, Alternative Schools-Institutions—totaling
$1.08 million through 2010.
- We're looking at a reduction in ROP funding of $1.29 million through 2010.
We are working on plans to reduce our costs and cover the remainder of these
cuts with existing resources. Local school districts that cover the excess
cost of county office programs have received equal or deeper cuts in their
revenues. Therefore, we are attempting to keep our costs equal or lower
than prior years' billings to school districts.
The reductions will force us to give potential layoff notices to all
non-permanent teaching staff, several ROP teachers and administrators on March
13th. We will have to decide whether we will be able to rescind these
notices by May 15th.
To balance our budget for the remainder of this year and next, we still will
need to make further cuts. As we determine what they are, we will let you
know. These are the worst cuts in a single year and over a two-year period
that I have experienced in my 35 years in education.
As odd as it may sound, what I have laid out above is a "best-case" scenario.
The budget hinges on $5.8 billion of revenue covered in six ballot measures that
voters must approve in a special election May 19. If all the measures do not
pass, the state will have to make deeper cuts; possibly much deeper.
There are some mitigating factors that may help us. We will get a break
in the amount of money that the state requires us to set aside for building
maintenance. Also, we expect to get help from the federal economic
stimulus package—we just don't know how much. (We do know, however, that the
package won't be enough to save us completely from having to make cuts.)
Another mitigating factor: This budget allows us options in our
budgeting process that we never had before. We have been given
unprecedented flexibility in transferring funds from certain programs to other
programs, which will give us an opportunity to be thoughtful and creative in
preserving important services.
In times like these, we have to be as thoughtful and creative as possible.
I promise you this: We are going to use all the resources available to us to
preserve our incredibly important role in education in this community.
I'll stay in touch. In the meantime, as always, thanks for reading.
--Chuck
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