OUSD Hands Out 51 Pink Slips
Eighty-five percent of budget goes to employee wages and benefits
By Daryl Kelley
For a decade, some Ojai teachers have received pink slips in mid-March, notifying them that their services might not be needed in the fall because of declining enrollment. Usually, most of those notices were rescinded.
But this time, the Ojai Unified School District may have no way to keep dozens of threatened teachers in their classrooms, because state and federal cuts, and fewer students, have left it with a nearly $3-million deficit next fall, a huge drop from this year’s budget of nearly $25 million.
Distraught district trustees voted Tuesday evening to notify 51 part- and full-time educators, including several managers, that they may have no jobs after June. Pink slips went out on Wednesday and Thursday.
That’s fewer than the 76 termination notices sent last year, when few teachers were actually laid off. But this year, officials said, there is little wiggle room in the state budget, and no new federal stimulus money such as the $1.3 million that rolled in this year.
The district could balance its budget by laying off 27 full-time educators, including three managers, but 51 were notified to give the district more flexibility in where and how it makes cuts. State law prevents a teacher from being dismissed unless notice is given by March 15.
This year’s “pink slip list” is especially grim, superintendent Hank Bangser told trustees. And it could reach “a significant distance down the seniority list” of teachers in the district.
Because 85 percent of the district’s budget goes to employee wages and benefits, that’s where trustees must look to cut, Bangser said.
Trustees will also consider soon proportionate reductions in the size of the district’s non-teaching staff, such as aides, secretaries, custodians and bus drivers. Fifteen full-time non-teaching positions need to be eliminated to balance the budget.
“Nobody is feeling there is going to be any relief,” Bangser said. “This is the end” of dodging the budget bullet, he said.
“This is a structural deficit, which means it doesn’t go away.”
That means that Ojai’s public schools will have fewer teachers, fewer class options and more students per class, officials said. There might also be fewer days of school. But just ow that shakes down is still up in the air.
Trustees must make those difficult choices during the next three months, giving final notice to teachers by mid-May and approving a budget by June 30.
“We’re really at this sort of precipice that we’ve never been at before,” Trustee Pauline Mercado said.
Even programs that are popular with parents and teachers are on the chopping block this time.
Size reduction of primary grade classes — kindergarten through third — are at risk. Those reductions to the current 20 students per class could be replaced with classes of 30, saving the district $400,000 as about 10 jobs are eliminated, Bangser told trustees.
“This is not a recommendation,” he said, “but it might be a place we have to go.”
Other options include a compromise, keeping primary classes at about 25 students, which would still save more than $200,000 annually.
John LeSuer, principal at Topa Topa Elementary, asked the board to do everything it can to keep class sizes down.
“At Topa Topa, our low economic sub-groups have doubled,” he said. “It’s really important that we try to keep these class sizes down.”
Advanced placement classes at Nordhoff High School are also in jeopardy, principal Dan Musick told the board. He has already decided to cut Spanish 5 and AP World History from the curriculum next fall, because the budget simply cannot support them any more, Musick said.
“This is the first year that we’ve said we are not going to have these classes next year,” he said. “We’re still going to have Spanish 4, a college-level class. And we still have three AP offerings in history — U.S., European and government.”
A shortened school year is also a distinct possibility.
Last year, teaching days were cut by five to 175. And the president of the Ojai Federation of Teachers, Martha Ditchfield, said that might be an option teachers prefer instead of layoffs. The district saves $100,000 for each of these so-called furlough days.
The teachers’ union distributed a survey this week, asking instructors to list their preferred cuts. The survey should be back by Monday, Ditchfield said.
“We’re asking: ‘What’s most important for you to keep?’” she said. “’What are you willing to give up?’”
If the district follows its 51 educator notices by laying off the equivalent of 27 full-time teachers and managers, and then another 15 non-teaching staffers, that would cut $2.8 million from the 2010-2011 budget, district analysts said.
It would also cut 41 people from the district’s full-time work force of 281: That’s nearly 15 percent of workers.
Under the new budget plan, the district would also reduce its emergency reserves from $742,000 to $217,000, just 1 percent of the total budget. State law requires a 3 percent reserve, but a waiver can be granted in dire economic times such as these.
Board President Kathi Smith asked Bangser to do all he can to survey parents as well as teachers.
And trustees agreed that the district should place a survey form on each school’s web site to gather parents opinions.
She mentioned that district voters had defeated an $89 per parcel tax that could have helped balance this year’s budget by yielding $600,000. Sixty-five percent of voters approved the tax, but it failed by 77 votes.
“Our taxpayers are asking us to diminish the education in this district,” Smith said. “It’s going to get worse.”
Other trustees also expressed dismay.
“I don’t understand the world, almost,” Trustee Rikki Horne said. “Yet, with all that, we’ll continue to educate our kids.”
Linda Taylor, a board member and former teacher, said she can hardly sleep with the responsibility: “All the gains of the last 15 years are really being wiped out, just flushed down the toilet.”
Trustee Steve Fields noted that the district has been shrinking for a decade as Ojai has grown older more rapidly than the rest of the county or state. The 3,000-student district is down about 50 more students this year, but seems to be stabilizing.
“We’ve been cutting, cutting and cutting,” Fields said. “In spite of that we’ve been able to keep what makes the district great.
“But it’s a slow bleed,” he added. “And it’s wrenching.”
Er no, it’s time for you to go back to Iowa. Bye!
Ojai is our home. It always has been a town of hicks. Can you go back to L.A.?
Can all the hicks go home now? Thanks.
Good. Teaching is a worthless endeavor anyhow.
Good point anonymous, and thank you for not replying to me in a derogatory manner.
No one is going to donate because the OUSD is not operated in an efficient manner. No sense throwing money at the problem it will not help the underlying problem. The OUSD is going down as evidence by the recent letter from Dr. Bangser which I appreciated for it’s candor even though it was bad news.
There is a blogger above somewhere who mentioned the money we lavish on our kids, their ugg boots and everything so why can’t we pay a little more into their education? Maybe we could start a school fund and it would be completely non profit and those who run it would have to be a well respected , long time citizens in our community. We can take up donations , asking a small single donation of 50 to 100 dollars that would go directly to supporting the teachers that teach those important classes that are being cut. Transparency would be the key with a monthly email showing exactly how the funds were distributed and jobs saved …not a thermometer sign stuck in front of the school, but an email or (if not computer) a letter sent to all donors detailing every penny of the fund and how it is being spent. I mean am I being stupid or what? I’ll just stop blogging if Im stupid, I hate wasting peoples time.
I think the 89 dollar parcel tax was a good idea. All these courses that are being cut out now because the voters shot it down? Why? Did someone tell those people that taxes are unAmerican and evil? That said, O-Tay, do you even live here? Your description of Ojai and the people in it is so far from the truth. We aren’t puppets, there is a lot of tolerance a lot of love and understanding. Do we have problems? Yes we do have problems like all cities but I don’t see the problems coming from folks like myself who have successfully raised kids here who have grown up under the system and now are mature adults with jobs and familys of their own. SOme of the problems with our kids stem from the hate thats like a past time for big companies that make money on music and video games like a light went off in some executives head, hey we can make money off of hate!! Lets feed that emotion it sells $$! Kids are more exposed to hate than ever before, you can’t blame Ojai or the tourists for the hate , looks at what your kids are playing and look at what your kids are reading and listening to. It is not Ojais fault there is a culture of hate out there being sold to our kids. It must be hard for teachers to deal with this phenomenon. My heart goes out to them and those who have received the dreaded pink slips.
Unfortunately,…Ojai has more puppets than human beings.Cattle and sheep for the slaughter…Sad but true…Ojai can be an Shangrarila, and for a long bit of history was…Yet the politically hungry… found this small haven as a prime breeding ground of “Hate” and took advantage of it…As the song said ” Go ahead and cheat your neighbor, go ahead and cheat a friend, do it in the name of heaven you will be justified in the end” Do I need to go on?Learn to take care of your own and those who wish to be part of the whole…Bottom line… If there is a great teacher, willing to teach that has been laid off…Pay them… as a teacher in your own community school/charter school. If they are a “scumbag union begging I deserve what ever I can get from you sort”,Then let the union support them…Folks… bottom line you have the right and the choice… not Sacramento, nor the unions, nor S.E.I.U., it’s all about you…Now… It’s about your children… How much do you really care…Bottom line, How much do you really cares?…The Ones that have always called Ojai home…You Transient,gang banger element,kooky doooky faddyy what everyittakes to shakiyupi the element for my sakekiment,L.A. establi,anti establi,antiwhoever,whantibe.elimentalestsaselishmenelist…evantually you will become : ” Extinct” You are the same type of folks to come to L.SA. in the 70′s to redefine it to your own wishes and destroy it… ass you hope to do in Ojai…Oh… maybe it didn’t work… Your $50,000 pay offs to your promoted consul people…” New Jersey Mikes?”… Oh… that was sad… what next…Cancer is a growth…Community is an action against a Cancer…Fear is a factor to gain control… For over 50 years the people of Estonia have waited, waited for their time for freedom..In one legend it is said,.. The Barn keeper sits by the fire…watches and only acts when the time is right. Patience is a weapon,..Caution, is a virtue…If any of you has any doubt’s about how Ojai can be unified and run… the watch this clip and find out for yourselves.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUbfyOVD0ko
Though I have my doubts that the Ojai Valley News will allow me to post this… But if by some miracle… It can happen..and you may be allowed to view this miracle of how a nothing country helped to bring down one of the most powerful nations in the world…This is a story of how culture saved a nation…And how Ojai can save itself…
Ojai… Stand for you self…Know yourself… as you always have…See you simplicity’s and be honored by it…embrace your simplicity, and be honored
ADMIN NOTE: Yes, the OVN will make an exception and allow this off-topic posting. But please, keep posts on-topic in the future.
Sooner or later, the flatulent, fast food consuming poor in Ojai will leave and accept the fact that they can not afford to live here. Ojai’s future is a rich resort destination and a second home zone for the educated and the wealthy. Long term investors are just waiting for the hicks to hit the road. The schools will be great after the current economic purge. Attention pick-up driving folk! Stop ignoring the calls from your banks! Foreclosure is here! Bye bye!