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Monday, Mar. 23, 2009

Middle Georgia schools look at fall job, pay cuts

School systems across Middle Georgia are already bracing for tough economic times in the school year ahead.

To scale back on their spending, many of them will cut their summer school remediation programs and hire fewer teachers for the fall, and they are eyeing pay cuts as well.

The Crawford County school system in Roberta, for example, is looking to slash almost $1 million in its $18 million fiscal 2010 general budget after it was hit with $1.14 million in state cuts and a decline in student population.

In February, the governor announced a cut of $98.7 million to the state Department of Education budget. School officials are also expecting more cuts for the coming school year.

To compensate, starting July 1, Crawford is proposing an across-the-board 2 percent pay cut for all 300 employees, including teachers.

System officials are also looking to cut 16 full-time positions and three part-time positions, which include teachers, paraprofessionals, bus drivers and Junior ROTC instructors, system spokesman Trey Seagraves said.

“It’s difficult to let staff go,” he said. “It’s tough for everybody.”

Bibb County and Houston County school systems have already announced that they are also eliminating summer school remediation and opting to tutor students in May. For Bibb, it will save $700,000. For Houston, about $500,000.

Although Bibb has not yet announced any proposed cuts for next school year, the system is furloughing 556 employees — not teachers or low-paid employees — for four to five days this school year. That is projected to save more than $800,000. Houston is also considering furloughs for an unspecified number of employees for two to three days. For the coming school year, Houston is also proposing a millage rate increase of up to 1.5 mills, as well as other cuts.

The Jones County school board has a work session scheduled for March 30, during which it will consider five-day furloughs for all employees who work more than 190 days during the year. That would include most jobs but not teaching positions.

The cuts that would begin this coming school year would save about $21,518 each furlough day. The furlough would mean a pay cut of about $3,200 for Superintendent Jim LeBrun, who earns $145,000 a year, and about $2,000 for principals. The school board may also consider cutting local supplements by $1,000 for each employee. Nine full-time positions and five part-time ones may also be eliminated, and 13 jobs from teacher retirements may go unfilled.

“We feel like at this point we may save most positions through reductions and moving things around,” LeBrun said.

The system, which amended its $29 million budget after taking a $1.7 million state cut, expects another loss of about $824,000 in state funding this fall, and it could lose about $700,000 in homestead exemption disbursements. Both Baldwin and Laurens county school systems are trying to save money through teacher attrition. About a dozen teachers in Milledgeville are retiring this spring, and contracts for some teachers were not renewed.

“Our middle school, for instance, had two art teachers and one is leaving, so we won’t have a second art teacher this fall,” said Baldwin County schools Superintendent Geneva Braziel. “Right now, we’re taking the hit like everyone else, but because we have people leaving, we’re not having to put people out of a job.”

Jerry Hatcher, the superintendent in Laurens County, also said that as teachers retire and leave this school year, the system isn’t replacing them.

To help ease school systems’ strained budgets, the state is relaxing the cap on the number of students to a classroom at the elementary and middle school grade levels so that systems won’t have to hire more teachers. Now, because of attrition and that flexibility, systems won’t need to hire as many new teachers for this coming fall.

“The increase in class size grades one to eight will be beneficial,” Hatcher said. He said the system is also looking at other cost-saving measures as well, but he would not go into specifics.

Jones, Laurens and Baldwin all said they were also eliminating their usual summer school programs to save money.

In doing so, Jones would save $90,000 from its budget, Laurens would save $83,000 and Baldwin about $70,000 in transportation and teacher pay.

To contact writer Julie Hubbard, call 744-4331.