Schools Budget Cuts Programs, Boosts Maintenance, Salaries

The Los Angeles Board of Education on Thursday approved a $13.2-billion budget for the 2005-06 school year that included $222.9 million in cuts to offices and programs, including an attendance incentive initiative and books for special education students, while increasing spending for school maintenance and preserving a 2% salary increase for teachers.

Some reductions in programs may be restored later in the year, said Budget Director Roger Rasmussen, because the board set aside $50 million in June for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s proposal to shift retirement costs to the district, which the Legislature rejected.

In addition, the district didn’t spend as much as it had anticipated last year, giving it an additional $46 million.

“It’s better than we thought, but it’s certainly not what we wanted,” Rasmussen said.

The district has slashed more than $1 billion in funding over the last three years.

The bulk of the most recent cuts, which the board adopted in a separate meeting in June, came from central offices and professional development.

“The board and the district staff worked together to try to find items that would have the least harmful effect in the classroom,” Rasmussen said.

L.A. Unified has a $7.1-billion general fund, which is used for instruction, special education, summer school and other programs. It is made up of federal, state and local revenues. About 80% of general fund money goes toward salaries and benefits. This year, the district preserved a 2% raise for its 45,000 teachers, which cost about $82 million.

The final budget allocated an additional $800 million from the general fund for a district initiative to divide large high school campuses into smaller and more personalized learning centers.

It also provided $2 million for the implementation of a new college preparatory curriculum, which will require all high school students to pass a set of classes needed for admission to four-year universities.

The budget allocated $8 million to school maintenance and took $21 million out of general funds to go toward opening new schools as part of an ambitious building and repair project aimed at ending severe classroom overcrowding. Thirty-two new schools will open during the 2005-06 school year.

Most of the funding for those construction projects has come from bond money, and the district is moving to put a $3.8-billion bond measure on the ballot in the November special election. Voters have approved more than $9.5 billion in three previous school bond measures.

The board also voted to spend $1 million in reserve funds to promote 47 part-time school bus drivers to full-time.

Some board members voiced concerns this week that general fund money should have also gone toward fixing campus air conditioners and closing the achievement gap among black and Latino students.

They also discussed promoting about 850 additional part-time district bus drivers to full-time, which would have cost about $20 million.

At Thursday’s meeting, Supt. Roy Romer told the board, “You just don’t have enough money to do everything here.”

The district is still facing a potential budget shortfall largely because of a proposal by Schwarzenegger to withhold the school funding that Proposition 98, approved by voters in 1988, requires. The law set up a funding formula that provides schools with at least 40% of the state’s budget each year and increases education spending with revenue.

The governor and education groups agreed last year to withhold about $2.2 billion in state funds due to schools under Proposition 98. The governor promised that he would reinstate the proposition’s provisions the following year and would not touch it again.

Instead, Schwarzenegger proposed a budget in January that would again withhold the guaranteed funds from schools and announced that he would seek voter permission to amend Proposition 98. The California budget was facing an $8.5-billion gap at the time.

In addition, the district’s elementary school enrollment is declining, which has resulted in less funding since the state provides money on a per-pupil basis.