Salary Issue Mars School Budget Picture : Finances: Pledge of more state funds improves outlook, but plan still fails to include enough to maintain current pay levels.

Los Angeles Unified School District officials presented a revised and more optimistic budget on Monday night that still fails to include an estimated $80 million needed to keep salaries at their current levels.

The school board became bogged down by controversies surrounding two related budget issues--the potential layoff of at least 1,000 teacher’s aides and the proposed use of federal equity funding for teacher training at 103 schools newly added to the LEARN program. Unable to reach consensus on either issue, the board postponed them to a special meeting next Monday.

Prospects for the nearly $4.3-billion budget improved in May when Gov. Pete Wilson signaled that he would build a 2.7% cost-of-living adjustment into the state budget. That raise represents an additional $60 million for Los Angeles Unified.

While saying that keeping salaries level is a top priority, district budget Director Henry Jones said the increase could not simply be transferred over to salaries. Half of it is needed to pull the district out of a projected deficit, and some must be used to offset higher-than-expected costs in other areas.

“What it doesn’t do is address fully what we really need to do for our bargaining units,” said Supt. Sid Thompson. “We’re looking for that money aggressively.”

The district’s announcement earlier this year that unionized employees could face a 4% cut from what they are making this year prompted angry cries of grandstanding from United Teachers-Los Angeles. On Monday, UTLA Vice President Day Higuchi reiterated the union’s position that up to $200 million more should be coming to the district from several sources--enough for a significant raise.

“That is based on a lot of ifs,” Higuchi acknowledged. “They’re not going to know how much they’re getting for several months . . . and they should not be frightening their employees. Our folks have got enough to worry about.”

Several board members also expressed concern that the budget could be too pessimistic.

But they stumbled on a thorny issue in discussing whether to pay for a fraction of LEARN teacher training with $1.2 million of federal Title 1 money, intended to improve educational opportunities at schools with significant populations of poor students.

Walter Backstrom, executive director of the union that represents 28,000 classified employees, said transferring that money into training would exacerbate a simmering crisis among teacher’s aides.

Title 1 money can be used for training in any year, but Backstrom said it is sorely needed this year to help schools hold on to teacher aides threatened with layoffs on July 1. The district recently changed the formula determining which schools qualify, adding 122 new ones and thus reducing the amount of money each receives.

Board members shied away from approving not only the $1.2 million for LEARN from Title 1, but also an additional $1.2 million from the district’s general fund.

Judy Burton, assistant superintendent in charge of LEARN, said she was uncertain whether to proceed with plans for a July 9 intensive training session in Palm Springs for the new schools.

“Today was the drop-dead date for us to make commitments on lodging and so forth,” she said. “Now I really don’t know what to anticipate.”

Commitments to fund the majority of the $10 million in training and other start-up costs for the new set of schools have been received from outside sources, including a grant from philanthropist Walter Annenberg, but most are dependent on the district’s donation.

Maria Casillas, director of the reform-minded Los Angeles Metropolitan Project, which had promised $5 million of the Annenberg money for the training, was angered by the board’s postponement of the item. “What they’re faced with is whether to improve the quality of teachers,” Casillas said. “Unless you’re saying it’s OK for some kids to be taught by aides. . . . If you’re going to create stability in the district, it’s got to start with the teacher.”