School Board Meets Tonight to Set Tentative Budget

by Rachel Dahl --  The Churchill County School District Board of Trustees will meet tonight, April 9th, to discuss and act upon a tentative budget for the 2019-20 school year.  The fiscal Year 2020 budget is due to the state department of education by April 15th. The budget committee met last week to talk about possible cuts to meet a $2.5 million shortfall. After a lengthy meeting lasting over three hours, proposed cuts were made to meet the shortfall that include a Reduction In Force or RIFs (layoffs) of nine classified positions. Other proposed cuts include:

• Site Budget reductions
• Savings from filling open positions with less expensive “new hires”
• Savings from not filling one administrative, nine classified, and four licensed positions
• Reducing Extra pay positions
• Reducing hours for classified positions by two hours on Fridays
• Transferring eight food service positions to employment with the food service contractor
• Reducing a Mechanic in the transportation department to part-time
• Transfer grant funded positions to ten open licensed positions

The total proposed cuts amount to $2,583,216. Several budget committee members expressed concerns with specific cuts including not hiring a Principal for Lahontan Elementary, the potential safety issues if cuts are made to transportation, the amount of work that would be moved to the business office by reassigning the food service secretary duties, and the logistics of closing the warehouse. Audience members spoke up concerning the idea of transferring the food service staff to Chartwells. Those district employees would become employees of the contractor and lose their district insurance and contributions to PERS. In addition, when the district has recovered, they would remain Chartwells employees and not be brought back into district employment. Trustee Phil Pinder said that by law the board has toset a  budget and make hard decisions that won’t sit well with anyone including the people who have to make them. “I get it its an ugly situation I want to assure you that if between now and Tuesday if anyone has any ideas that aren’t getting heard make sure to direct those to myself or anyone on this committee.” Trustee Carmen Schank said that she was a teacher in the district for 20 years and has been through this before. She said that there hasn’t been any discussion about the idea of every employee giving up their step increases which would result in a $400,00 savings. She said, “We can do these cuts or everyone could give up a small part, the raises you got last year are in fact a part of this problem, if everyone would be willing to give up something small instead of all these cuts.” Elena Marsh, budget committee member and high school math teacher responded that she was speechless at the suggestion. “It is inappropriate to place this on our shoulders, you can’t ask us to do that, it’s negotiated in closed meetings and we can’t talk about it.” Salary and benefits are part of the contract that is negotiated between the district and the teachers’ union. Ozzie Henke asked if anyone had explored the idea of furloughs, and Boone supported looking into potential cost savings. Superintendent Summer Stephens, who was hired last summer and inherited this budget shortage, thanked the committee for their work and conversations. “I’m grateful for everyone participating and I encourage everyone to keep sending ideas. We’ve received some letters with suggestions that I will share with the board, but please if you’ve talked to one board member share that idea with other members.” Phyllys Dowd, the Director of Business Services, reminded the committee that after the tentative budget is approved and sent to the state this month, the final budget is due to the State on June 8^th. Once the legislature adjourns, in June, and revenue is confirmed, there is a possibility of reversing any cuts that are made at the board meeting on April 9^th. Trustees on the committee reminded everyone to send in any ideas by email or to call them. The board meeting will be held tonight at the district offices in The Pit at 690 S. Maine Street. The meeting begins at 6:00 p.m. The board packet is available here: Board Packet.   Support local, independent news – contribute to The Fallon Post, your non-profit (501c3) online news source for all things Fallon. Never miss the local news -- read more on The Fallon Post home page.