Conejo Valley School District OKs Hiring of 50 New Teachers : Education: Trustees approve a budget of $75 million, $4.1 million more than this year. No change in base salaries is planned.

A growing Conejo Valley Unified School District on Tuesday approved a $75-million budget that hires 50 new teachers and pays for continuing earthquake repairs, but does not raise teachers’ base salaries.

Trustees unanimously voted to spend $4.1 million more in 1995-96 than they allocated in the 1994-95 budget. The bulk of new spending, $2.8 million, will pay for repairs to school buildings damaged in the Northridge earthquake and will be funded by disaster aid money from the federal government, said Regena Ward, head of accounting for the district.

The remainder of the $4.1 million is expected to come from the state because of a 2.73% cost-of-living increase that is expected to be given to all school districts in the 1995-96 state budget.

Also, the district will receive additional state money because of an increase in enrollment. The budget projects 74 new students, bringing the district’s expected enrollment to 17,638.

While students will see about 50 new teachers in Thousand Oaks classrooms in September, only three of them will fill newly created positions, Ward said. The others, many of whom replace retiring teachers, will actually help the district reduce the amount it spends on teacher salaries from $33 million in this year’s budget to $32.5 million in the 1995-96 plan.

“New teachers coming in start at a lower salary,” Ward said.

Teacher salaries, the district’s largest expense, are of special concern to the Unified Assn. of Conejo Teachers, the union whose contract expires June 30. The budget continues a 3% pay cut that the teachers accepted during their last contract negotiations, and does not raise the base salary. The union has asked for a raise and the return of the 3% pay cut.

Union President John Uelmen said the group is undaunted by adoption of the budget.

“It’s not fixed,” he said. “It’s still negotiable.”

He said contract negotiations will begin in earnest in August, after the governor signs the state budget. The district must also revise its budget then.

In general, the district is on “very firm” financial footing, Ward said. “We’re not spending any more than we’re taking in,” she said.

Supt. Jerry C. Gross told board members that they should be pleased with the balanced budget.

“The board is hearing a budget which for the first time in many, many years is a balanced budget. We’re proud of that,” Gross said.

Still, Ward said the school district is not awash with cash, either.

“It was a hold-the-line budget. There’s no increase in services,” she said. “We don’t have any extra.”

The $2.4 million that the district projects it will have in the bank at the end of the year is mainly the reserve required by state law, Ward said.

Students will see the effects of the budget not only reflected in new teachers, and the repaired walls and ceilings of quake-damaged classrooms, but in the pages of new books.

Much of the $471,000 allotted for new books will pay for math textbooks to replace the 8-year-old ones now in use, Assistant Supt. Richard Simpson said.