Plan Would Cut Schools’ Deficit by $5.4 Million : Simi Valley: Reduced payments to the employees’ health programs and the sale of excess real estate are suggested to the board.

Responding to demands to curb spending or lose control of their finances, Simi Valley school officials presented a plan Tuesday to cut $5.4 million from the district’s $5.9-million projected deficit during the next two school years.

A list of possible reductions--such as reduced payments to employees’ health plans and the sale of excess real estate--was presented to the school board Tuesday evening during a two-hour budget study session.

“These are ways I think we can effectively reduce this budget,” said Wayne Templeton, the district’s chief financial analyst.

The board took no action Tuesday evening. A final vote on the reductions is expected Dec. 13, and the district’s plan must be submitted to county school officials by Dec. 31.

“We’re not balancing the budget yet,” Assistant Supt. E. Leon Mattingley explained. “The county just wants to be sure we have a plan in mind.”

During the Tuesday evening meeting, Templeton said he thought the proposed cuts would reassure the county. “I think I can convince the county superintendent of schools that we are OK,” he said.

In August, schools Supt. Charles Weis notified six Ventura County districts, including Simi Valley and Moorpark districts and the Oxnard elementary school district, that they had to cut projected spending for the 1995-96 school year or face sanctions.

“Basically, what we are saying is they have to get control,” Weis said Tuesday.

If school districts do not take swift steps to reduce spending, Weis said, the county will act on behalf of the state and take over the districts’ finances. But that has never happened in Ventura County and is not likely to occur, he added. California school districts are required by law to balance their budgets.

“Poor fiscal decisions and bad financial planning” have led to district takeovers in other counties, Weis said. “That’s not the case in Simi Valley.”

The Simi Valley Unified School District is the largest district in the county with more than 18,000 students, and trustees have struggled in recent years to balance its $75.5-million budget.

To cut costs, the board made up a $2.5-million shortfall this school year in part by eliminating about 24 teaching positions and imposing a $200 student busing fee. The school board will begin its official budget planning in January in hopes of adopting a 1995-96 spending plan July at the beginning of the fiscal year.

In the meantime, school officials will prepare a letter to Weis and approve a cost-cutting plan for board approval in mid-December.

In Moorpark, where the district is facing a projected $450,000 deficit in its $24-million budget next year, officials outlined cost-saving measures last summer, Assistant Supt. Carmela Vignocchi said.

School officials agree that without additional funds from Sacramento, balancing budgets next year is going to be difficult.

“Our school district, like all other school districts in the state, has not received a cost-of-living increase in four years,” Vignocchi said. “I don’t know any district that isn’t struggling.”