School districts throughout region battle with budget cuts
By Stephanie Bertholdo bertholdo@theacorn.com

Area school district chiefs met last week at the Ventura County Office of Education to discuss pending budget cuts in Sacramento and how to deal with a loss of funding that could severely impact the quality of education in local classrooms.

The school superintendents aren't the only ones upset over the possibility of losing billions of dollars in state revenue. Parents, teachers, principals and union officials filled the boardroom at the county office to vent their frustrations.

Charles Weis, Ventura County Superintendent of Schools, kicked off the Feb. 29 meeting with a snapshot of what the $4.7 billion in cuts to schools will mean. If Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger follows through with his plan to slash spending by 10 percent, the average loss to each school district in the state will be $7.7 million. Class size will increase 35 percent, and every classroom will lose about $24,000 in funding, Weis said.

Thousands of teachers, administrators and classified employees will be laid off, and many bus services, maintenance crews and school nurses will disappear, he said. Art, music, vocational programs and other services will also be on the chopping block.

"I've never seen cuts of this size in 15 years," Weis said, adding that more money is spent on prisons in California than on state universities. "Investing in prisons does not grow a state economy."

Under Proposition 98, schools are constitutionally guaranteed 40 percent of the state budget, but once the governor declared a fiscal emergency in January, funding guarantees were null and void. The Legislature is required to find a way to pay their bills.

Ventura Unified School District Superintendent Trudy Arriaga remembered when every school in her district employed a music specialist. Only two music specialists are employed today, and their jobs are threatened by the cuts, she said.

Within three years, California dropped from No. 44 in the nation for per pupil spending to No. 46, Arriaga said. "Are we waiting for the big 5-0?" she asked.

"I propose this budget leaves all children behind," Arriaga said in reference to the federally mandated No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. "It's not about failing schools but how we as adults are failing children."

Paul Chatman, president of the California School Boards Association, said that while classroom size will increase, electives in middle school and high school will be cut.

"Every child in this state has been devalued by $800," Chatman said. "We have a Legislature that has their foot stuck in the mud."

Cuts versus tax hike

Chatman suggested raising taxes, a move Republicans in the state Legislature have long opposed.

"We need to run this state as a business," Chatman said. "(No one) opens a business and says, 'I will never raise prices.'"

Even longtime anti-tax guru Jere Robbins of Thousand Oaks believes a tax hike may be in store for Californians.

"We are in so deep and the state Legislature has continued to spend when they should have been holding the reins," Robbins said in a separate phone interview. "Now they have to face the music." He said a combination of deep cuts and some tax increases will be necessary.

"The governor has proposed closing lots of tax loopholes," Robbins said. "They've borrowed about as much as they can handle. Borrowing any more isn't a logical option."

Stephen Blum, president of the Ventura Unified Education Association, said the pledge to not raise taxes was "ridiculous, preposterous."

"We need a true action hero," Blum said.

Declining enrollment

Making matters worse for California schools is the matter of declining enrollment. Mario Contini, superintendent of the Conejo Valley Unified School District, said two neighborhood schools are set to close in the Conejo Valley because of declining enrollment and the prospect of an $8-million cut to the district budget.

Contini said he's worried about "antiquated infrastructure," technological gridlock and the possibility of losing teachers to higherpaying districts. "The ability to compete will be more difficult," he said.

PTA can't save the day

Parent-teacher associations have kept many programs humming despite the lack of state funding, said Aleta Smith, president of the Conejo Council, one of the eight councils that connect PTAs throughout Ventura County. She recollected how parents rallied to "near exhaustion" in 2004 when the governor threatened to dismantle minimum funding to schools.

In 2004, a $4-billion budget deficit brought the state to a halt. Now, four years later, the deficit has swelled to $16 billion. Smith isn't sure parents can fill such a large gap. The negative effects of cuts will reverberate for years, she said.

"Our teachers can no longer do more with less," said Peggy Buckles, chair of the legislative action committee for the 12th district PTA.

John Puglisi, superintendent of Mesa Union School District, said funding comes down to the "haves and havenots." Once programs are cut from the budget, he said, children from more affluent homes and school districts will have access to music and art lessons and other resources through PTAs. Economically disadvantaged children, however, will suffer.

"The argument is about educating other people's children," Puglisi said. He said schools are the "engines" of the economy and democracy, and California schools require a "worldclass investment to go with world-class standards."

Special education strain

Mary Samples, executive director of the Ventura County Special Education Local Plan Area (SELPA), said while the number of students with learning disabilities is decreasing, the number diagnosed with autism continues to rise.

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act is a federal mandate, Samples said, and the federal government has set a goal to fund 40 percent of special education by 2014. But rather than inching forward to meet the goal, state and federal funding has actually dropped from 19 percent to 17 percent over the last few years, she said. Districts in SELPA have been forced to backfill special education programs through general funds. Samples estimates the cost to local districts at $70 million.

Special education costs in Las Virgenes and Simi Valley unified school districts are among the highest in the state, according to statistics provided by School Services of California. Both districts spend almost 28 percent of their general fund money on special education.

Next steps

Californians Organized to Rescue Education, a grass-roots organization in Las Virgenes Unified, will conduct a community action forum on April 2 for parents throughout the region.

For information about the time and location, contact Penny Salomon at Cvs619@charter.net.