NEWPORT BEACH : School Board Weighs 1992-93 Budget Cuts

The Newport-Mesa Unified School District is considering cutting 80 teachers, freezing employee salaries and deferring cost-of-living adjustments, among other preliminary proposals, to balance next year’s budget.

The 1992-93 school district budget is expected to have a $3.6-million shortfall, and trustees will need to cover that with service and employee cuts.

“It’s nothing new. We’ve been down this road before. We’ve always worked it out,” said school board President Forrest K. Werner.

The plans were discussed by the Board of Education in a previous session, and talks are likely to resume at another closed-door meeting today.

Teachers are likely to be hit the hardest under next year’s cuts, by having either their jobs eliminated, pay frozen or inflation adjustments deferred until the district can pay them.

Non-teaching employees were targeted this year and are unlikely to be affected as severely next year.

“We’re down to the bone,” said Michael Parks, a field representative for the California State Employees Assn., which represents most of the district’s 850 non-teaching, classified employees. “It would probably hit certificated (teachers) more than classified (employees).”

A main reason for the shortfall in the estimated $80-million budget is that the district needs to replenish its nearly depleted funding reserves and plans to set aside $2 million this year to do so.

The problem is that the district only expects to receive new property tax revenue of $2.8 million, which will barely cover the reserve payment, let alone handle increased operating costs.

Lower-than-expected tax returns and delinquent payments hurt the district this year, necessitating the elimination of dozens of non-teaching positions to cover the unexpected shortfall, and district officials are concerned that next year’s scenario will be similar.

Unlike other districts in the county, Newport-Mesa has a rich property tax base, which means that those taxes provide the main funding source for the district.

The district hopes to balance its budget by the end of the fiscal year, which concludes in June.