500 County Educators Face Loss of Jobs : Schools: March 15 was the deadline to issue preliminary layoff notices. If the state does not provide enough money for their budgets, districts would be forced to send final notices in May.

School psychologist Michael Hass usually deals with students’ fears. But lately, he’s been grappling with his own anxiety.

Hass received a preliminary layoff notice from the Placentia Unified School District on Saturday. Although he may not receive a final notice by the May 15 deadline mandated by state law, he’s already asking friends if they know of any available jobs.

Hass and at least 500 other educators in the county are in jeopardy of losing their jobs for the next school year in the wake of proposed heavy slashes in state education funding. In Placentia, school officials have issued about 140 preliminary layoff notices to teachers, administrators, nurses and counselors. Santa Ana has issued pink slips to about 200 employees, and 46 teachers and administrators in San Juan Capistrano have received notices that they may be out of a job next fall.

Layoff notices in the spring are nothing new for educators. District officials are required by state law to send preliminary notices to employees by March 15 in case the state does not provide enough money for their budgets. But rarely have they been forced to send final notices by the state-mandated May 15 deadline.

Since school districts often prepare preliminary budgets before state allocations to schools are completed, administrators issue layoff notices to balance their first-draft spending plans. Usually, the preliminary notices are rescinded after the state provides enough funds to balance the districts’ budgets without layoffs.

This year, however, the preliminary layoff notices are coupled with Gov. Pete Wilson’s proposal to suspend Proposition 98, a move which, if passed by the state Legislature, would cut state funds to schools by $2 billion over 18 months. Proposition 98, passed by the voters in 1988 as an amendment to the state Constitution, requires that at least 40% of state general-purpose tax revenues go to public schools and community colleges.

With such dismal news coming from Sacramento, district officials have found themselves dismantling the very programs they implemented to help students, said Timothy VanEck, assistant superintendent for personnel services of the Placentia Unified School District.

“We’re going back to bare bones in the classroom,” VanEck said. “Our test scores had soared in the past few years because of the extra programs and people we had hired to help these kids. Now, people are living in suspension until Sacramento decides what to do. That’s the cruel part.”

Although the layoff notices are preliminary and final notification of layoffs, if necessary, won’t be issued until May, educators say there is little hope in the air. With Wilson’s announcement, school districts throughout the state are taking no chances with their budgets and have resorted to what they call “riffing,” or reducing the work force.

“We’ve done March notices in the past to give us flexibility,” said Rudy M. Castruita, superintendent of the Santa Ana Unified School District. “The scary part this time is that there is a clear message from the governor indicating that he is not going to fund education and provide cost-of-living adjustments.”

School districts are already reeling from financial restraints. Teachers say morale is low in districts facing layoffs and stringent cutbacks. But school officials say they have no choice but to cut personnel who were once considered essential in schools, such as nurses, music instructors and counselors.

“People don’t realize how bad it is in education until it’s too late,” said Jim Harlan, executive director of the West Orange County United Teachers Assn., an umbrella union representing teachers in Huntington Beach, Fountain Valley and other districts. “Parents are going to see the impacts next fall.”

The Santa Ana and Placentia school districts were among the hardest hit in the county.

Placentia Unified has to slash as much as $9 million from next year’s school budget. As a result, the school district issued layoff notices to about 140 employees despite pleas from parents and students. One potential loss is the district’s entire elementary school music program.

The music program has been one of the few ways teachers have been able to maintain contact with parents, said Cindy Lee, president of the Assn. of Placentia-Linda Educators.

“It’s too much too soon,” Lee said. “There’s panic here. They are taking the entire music program out of the elementary schools. Eventually it’s going to affect the high school program. Students will be less enthusiastic attending school.”

For the next school year, Santa Ana has to cut at least $13.2 million to stay out of the red. The slashes affect at least 200 positions, including 84 of the district’s bilingual instructional assistants. Dismissing the bilingual aides would hit particularly hard because half of the district’s 46,000 students have limited English-speaking skills.

“We’re like the messengers from Sacramento with all these cuts,” Castruita said. “I feel for the instructional aides. They are the lifeline for the non-English-speaking students. It’s hard for me to let them go because some of them are the sole breadwinners of the family. It’s painful.”

While Hass, psychologist at Primavera School in Anaheim, is not the sole breadwinner of his family, the idea of losing his job in the district and being unemployed remains scary. A psychologist since 1977, the 38-year-old Hass says unemployment could hurt his family.

“It would certainly get very tight for us,” he said. “My wife makes a good income, but if I was unemployed for a real long time, we’d be in trouble. There’s a lot of middle-class people who are living on the edge.”

The news of pending layoffs has been frightening to students and teachers, said Rick Bryan, president of the Santa Ana Educators Assn., which represents 2,100 school employees.

“Santa Ana is the largest school district with incredible growth, and still we face cuts,” Bryan said. “What I find myself doing is trying to calm the folks down. People are scared.”