Pay Levels Restored for 250 School Employees
A rosier financial picture has prompted the Laguna Beach Unified School District to restore salary levels for 250 employees who were forced to take a 5% cut more than a year ago.
Because of higher property tax revenue estimates, the board set aside $245,313 to increase salaries to what they were in the 1995-96 school year budget, said Barbara Callard, the district administrator. The move is retroactive to July 1997, said Kathryn A. Turner, the school board president.
Salaries were slashed in late 1996, when board members scrambled to eliminate an $800,000 shortfall. But the district’s finances have improved, according to an analysis prepared by School Services of California Inc.
“The district deserves congratulations for having come so far so fast in putting its house in order following the 1995-96 financial crisis,” William C. Pieper, the consulting director of School Services, wrote in the report.
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