Markeshia Ricks Photo
Superintendent Mayo: Worried more about next year.
The school district is facing a $4.6 million deficit in its current budget — one it is confident can tackle — but it is concerned about a bigger, scarier deficit looming next year.
That’s what the Board of Education learned from Interim Superintendent Reggie Mayo and Chief Operating Officer Will Clark during its last regular meeting of the month Monday night.
Clark: Deficit primarily salary driven.
Clark said that a number of factors contribute to the hole in the district’s $182 million budget about halfway through the school year. One of the most significant is the cost of personnel.
The district has responded to the Board of Ed’s push to make sure classroom assignments are filled, particularly before any central office hiring.
Meanwhile, grant money has run out for numerous positions, forcing the district to figure out how to either cover those costs with new grant funds, or to use general operating funds Mayo suggested that the district create a committee to devise a protocol for how it will handle costs when grants end.
“Four point six million dollars is four point six million dollars,” Mayo said. “It’s not insurmountable at this time of the year. I think we may be able to overcome most of this if not all of it.”
Mayor Toni Harp, who serves as board president, said that $4.6 million sounds like a lot of money, but in the grand scheme of the district’s budget it represents just a little over 2 percent and she believes that the district can find that much savings in six months.
“I have every confidence that Dr. Mayo and his team will be able to do that,” she said. “I don’t think there is any reason to run out of here thinking the sky is falling. My expectation is that this will be done in a way that minimizes impact in classrooms and right sizes us. I have confidence in you folks and I’m sure you won’t let any of our parents, students or taxpayers down.”
Mayo said that absorbing grant-paid positions into the operating fund will not be sustainable in the long run, particularly if the state continues to cut its funding to municipalities and their school districts. He said the district will be looking to close the deficit without cutting personnel, but his bigger concern is next year’s budget.
The state is already facing a $1.5 billion deficit for the next two-year operating budget. So cuts looms.
“We cut people right now, we’re not going to save a lot of money this year [because of] sick time, vacation time,” he said. “Next year is going to be a tough year for education. I think Gov. [Dannel P.] Malloy has done a wonderful job in terms of funding education over the last several years, but I just don’t think they’re going to have much of a choice but to do something to education as well as many other things. So we’re talking about a combination of things.”
Those combinations include Mayo personally scrutinizing all personnel and non-personnel requests. Clark said that special education, which is currently projected to run over budget, is getting some additional attention. Though he said it might be too early to know whether special education is truly over budget.
“It’s something that we’re working on very closely with special ed folks to determine the exact placement we have in the budget, and to tie a number to a program, to a kid, to a school and the offsetting revenue streams that might be there,” he said.
Clark said the district has already seen cuts from the state for education cost sharing, or ECS funds, and school-based health care. He said the district was able to absorb those cuts internally without impacting student delivery, but that will have to be watched carefully going forward, particularly as budget season gets underway for the city in just a few months. He said as grants come in the district might have to consider service adjustments and make sure all classroom assignments are aligned.
Joyner: Personnel audit needed.
Board member Ed Joyner recommended conducting a personnel audit to make sure people are where they’re supposed to be in the system. He said an audit that determines where everybody is, what they do and their position’s impact on children will reveal whether the system is properly aligned.
“We’re going to have some stormy days ahead for education,” Joyner predicted Monday night, alluding not only to cuts at the state level, but to changes that might come from the federal government under a new president and education secretary. “That means we have to bear down and make some hard decisions and make sure that those hard decisions don’t touch kids.”
Fellow board member Michael Nast echoed Joyner’s point, suggesting that such an audit will be especially crucial as the district prepares for the next budget cycle and has to weigh whether it can provide more compensation for its paraprofessionals and security guards.
“If we do that,” he said of an increase for paraprofessionals and security guards, “something has to go. I think $182 million is not going to cover everything we have. We’re not going to keep everyone happy.” The school board two weeks ago called for a raise for paraprofessionals, who start out at $17.79 an hour for three to seven hours of work a day.
Clark said that in fact the district is already engaged in such a review, which will cross reference personnel with assignments and titles; salaries; classroom size and physical infrastructure of the school building. He said a report will be created not just for the sake of having a report, but for the sake of creating a tool that will help principals and directors right size their staff, but also identifying and justifying what’s really needed and valued.
“If we value something we want to try our best to fund it,” Clark said.
Nast: Not time to panic.
Nast said seeing such a deficit halfway through the year is not uncommon and no reason to panic. “We still have six months to go deal with it, and I really feel good about this,” he said. “My concern is really next year. It’s not that we don’t have problems this year, but it’s not unusual this time of year to have a little deficit.”
How many people working in New Haven Public Schools make six figures? Let's start with the need of all these folks and I bet we can make a big dent in the deficit in less than 24 hours.