District OKs New Round of Layoffs to Lessen Fiscal Crisis : Budget: At least two dozen employees will lose jobs, while others will work shorter hours. Newest action saves district about $800,000.

Montebello school officials have decided to lay off at least two dozen non-teaching employees and reduce the working hours of dozens of others in a new round of budget cuts.

School Board President Willard Yamaguchi blinked back tears during a meeting on Oct. 3 as he read aloud, one by one, a list of positions to be cut. An audience of more than 110 district employees and others listened in near silence to the technical titles that translated to people: bus operations supervisor, clerical assistant II, library/media technician, and so on.

The latest cuts in the Montebello Unified School District totaled $800,000. Since April, the financially strapped district has slashed the budget by $26.7 million to $101.5 million for the current school year. About 145 district employees--most of them teachers--lost jobs as a result of the previous cuts.

After Yamaguchi completed reading the latest job cuts, a buzz went through the crowd. Some wondered aloud how their departments would adjust with less help; others wondered how they would fare without a job.

The transportation department will lose two bus drivers, a mechanic and a supervisor. Transportation Director Dave Miller said the cuts would stretch remaining employees to their limits.

“It’s a risk,” he said. “No one can function at that pace, year-round, day after day, without it taking its toll.”

The district may be able to withstand the loss of the drivers because it has already canceled most field trips to save money, acting Business Manager Glenn Sheppard said.

But officials also decided to eliminate construction managers, secretaries, custodians, locker room attendants, a typewriter repairman, a computer programmer and a hazardous materials worker. Every job is important, Acting Supt. Darline Robles said. “Things that we used to do aren’t going to get done, and the community is going to be aware that it’s not the same operation, unfortunately,” she said.

Losing the warehouse delivery worker means that teachers and schools “will run out of critical goods during the school day and have to do without or send somebody to pick up things,” Sheppard said.

The hazardous materials worker was replacing outdated, broken asbestos tiles in district schools. His supervisor will take over, but Sheppard questioned whether the supervisor can handle the added workload. “There are millions of tiles,” Sheppard said.

Custodial reductions would also result in visible changes, he added. “Two years ago, under the good old days, there was already a question on whether the classrooms were being cleaned adequately,” he said. “And now, we’re cutting back even more. We’re going from a bad situation to even worse.”

Ray Escobar, 56, one of two technicians who fixes typewriters for both employees and the typing classes, will lose his job despite almost 15 years with the district. He wonders what students will do when their machines break down. “There’s no budget to buy new machines. I have to keep them going,” he said.

Escobar has a heart pacemaker and said that a man of his age and physical condition would have a hard time finding another job or affordable health insurance. His layoff is scheduled to take effect just days before he would have become eligible for increased retirement benefits, including post-retirement health insurance, he said.

In addition to the specific layoffs, schools must reduce their secretarial payroll by 10%, either through layoffs or shortened working hours. Remaining custodial workers and security officers must also cut their hours.

Before unanimously approving the list, board members passionately debated their limited options during the 4 1/2-hour meeting. Yamaguchi said he would have preferred to see a list that contained more supervisors and administrators.

“I see a lot of Indians taking the hits on it and not too many chiefs,” he said. “We should look at how to keep Indians rather than chiefs. That’s the bottom line.”

Frank Serrano complained that he and other board members had not been given enough time to consider the list of proposed cuts last week. “I want to think about this again,” he said. But Business Manager Sheppard argued that if board members delayed a decision, even more layoffs would be needed to achieve the $800,000 budget cut.

Sheppard also noted that the state controller’s office was continuing to monitor how well the district handled its financial crisis. Delays in making necessary budget cuts would give state officials more justification to step in and take control of the district, he said. In May, the controller’s office placed Montebello near the top of its list of 32 school districts most likely to become insolvent.

Acting Supt. Robles said she would explore other options, but she advised board members to approve the cuts to get the district past the budget emergency.

Unless staff can devise another plan, typewriter repairman Ray Escobar will have to surrender a job he has enjoyed for the last 15 years. He said he’s never been fired or laid off before, and took a job with the district because “everybody said school districts have good retirement benefits and good security. But I guess it’s not as true as they say. There is no golden handshake for me.”