Report Warns of Need to Cut School Staffs

More than half of Los Angeles Unified School District campuses may have to cut staffing costs within the next 2 1/2 years to meet conditions of a 1992 lawsuit settlement that sought to even out school spending, according to a report released Monday.

The lawsuit was filed eight years ago by a group of African American and Latino parents upset about perceived funding inequities between richer and poorer areas. It is expected to dramatically change the way Los Angeles Unified funds its schools.

But the report, presented to the school board by district staff, does not clearly prove the suit’s assumptions that the district consistently pays more for better-qualified teachers and administrators in affluent areas. Instead, staff spending inequities largely were related to school size, with smaller campuses spending more per student and larger schools spending less.

“Size is the prevailing issue, there’s no question about that,” said Gordon Wohlers, assistant superintendent for school reform. Wohlers said all schools require a basic core administrative staff, which raises the per-student cost at smaller schools.

Under terms of what became commonly known as the Rodriguez consent decree, Los Angeles Unified must equalize per-pupil spending at nine out of 10 schools by July, 1997. The decree included provisions for compensating smaller schools for higher administrative costs but did not spell out exactly how that should occur.

Currently, 54% of the 564 schools surveyed exceed the average per-student cost for staff. The remaining schools fall below that average--which ranged from $1,406 per year for an elementary student to $1,681 for a high school student--and would be entitled to spend more under the settlement.

Next month, board members will begin discussing which schools face the largest cuts and how to make them. Ultimately, many staffing decisions will be left to the individual schools.

But several board members said they are beginning to worry about the urgency and scope of the task ahead.

“It’s important that we set benchmarks for (school) improvement,” said board member Leticia Quezada. “Otherwise, what I’m afraid of is that all schools will wait until the last three months, and then they’ll say, ‘We can’t do it.’ ”

The top-spending elementary school campuses were Bellagio Newcomer School, which is in Brentwood but buses in newly arrived students from all over Los Angeles, and Coeur D’Alene School in Venice, which has a large program for homeless children.

At the bottom of the spending list were Crescent Heights School in the Wilshire district and Emelita School in Encino.

For middle schools, Burbank and Pacoima middle schools headed the spending list, and 32nd Street--USC’s performing arts magnet school--was at the bottom. For high schools, Wilson High on the Eastside, Banning High in Wilmington and Fairfax High spent the most. The least was spent by Los Angeles Center for Enriched Studies in the Wilshire district and the Downtown Business Magnet.

Some district officials noted that the report does not provide a complete picture of relative school expenditures because it only includes staff salary categories covered by the settlement. Neither the report nor the settlement took into account a myriad of other local, state and federal money.