By Annie Goeller, Daily Journal of Johnson County staff writer
Teachers, principals and administrators would be laid off, a classroom currently at 20 students could grow to 24, and certain classes at the high school and middle school may be offered less frequently after Franklin school district leaders recommended ways to cut $2.8 million from the budget.
After more than two months of review and debate, Franklin school officials rolled out their plan for how to cut the budget. The $2.8 million in cuts was necessary after lower enrollments and state funding cuts reduced the money they'd have this school year.
One focus throughout the process was to try to affect classroom learning as little as possible, although officials said avoiding that completely was impossible.
"There is no way you can avoid people that are going to impact the classroom. But we continued to ask the question: How will this impact student achievement?" director of business and operations Jeff Mercer said.
Range of savings
The list of more than 50 recommendations includes cuts of as little as $400 for turning off parking lot lights at Webb Elementary School after 9 p.m. to more than $500,000 by eliminating 24 teaching positions.
Nearly half of the cuts, or about $950,000, came from laying off employees, including the teaching positions, six administrators, 12 non-teaching positions, such as classroom assistants and secretaries and three custodial and maintenance workers.
Officials hope not all those teachers will need to be laid off. At least 11 are expected to leave the school district through a voluntary early-retirement program.
Also on the list of cuts: one of three high school assistant principals, the two elementary school assistant principals, the director of human resources, the director of operations and one of the three athletics department staff.
School officials had said layoffs would be a last resort, and the state superintendent of public instruction and the governor both said teacher layoffs should be avoidable.
But officials reviewed suggestions from the state and had done many of them, such as freezing wages, stopping out-of-state travel and reducing operations budgets. And some others, such as going with the state's insurance program, actually would cost more, Superintendent David Clendening said.
"Those were wonderful ideas, but we thought about them. Give us credit Governor Daniels, we're trying," Clendening said.
Shortfall grew
With 9 percent of the school district's general fund budget being cut, layoffs were a must, he said.
About half of the shortfall, or $1.4 million, was expected when the school year began because student enrollment came in less than expected and utilities and unemployment benefit costs increased. Both of those meant that the school district was over its budget for the school year.
The other half of the shortfall, or about $1.35 million, was a cut in state funding. School districts across Indiana lost money when the state cut school funding by about $300 million to make up for its budget shortfall.
Now, school officials plan to create a transition committee to help figure out how to make sure class sizes remain manageable, adjust school schedules as needed for the cuts and decide who takes on additional responsibilities after six administrators are let go.
"We are going to be left with holes in our district when people leave," Clendening said.
Not all of the cuts will boost the budget immediately.
Teachers are on a one-year contract, which ends this summer, and administrators are on a two-year contract that ends the summer of 2011. None of those employees can be let go, and their salaries and benefits stopped, until their contract ends, Mercer said.
The cuts will allow the school district to avoid a public referendum, asking voters to allow them to raise property taxes. School officials didn't want to use that option but were concerned it might be needed when the shortfall nearly doubled due to state cuts.
Revenue dropped
Franklin schools faced multiple hits in revenues for this school year, including:
• About $400,000 less in state funds, when they projected gaining about 60 students this year, but they actually had no new students and lost seven from the previous school year
• $1.35 million cut in state funding
• More than $660,000 in increased expenses, including higher utility bills and unemployment compensation
• $374,000 in funding lost when the state denied the school district's previous appeal of operating expenses in order to afford the higher costs of the high school and middle school.
Facing an initial shortfall of about $1.4 million, school officials surveyed all school employees and created a 12-member committee of parents, school employees and residents to look at ways to make the cuts.
Committee member Mary Beth Hensley said the layoffs would have been avoidable with the initial shortfall.
But when the state cut another $1.35 million in funding, the committee had to look to employee layoffs, she said.
Committee members and school officials looked at multiple ways to reduce the budget, including operating more efficiently and cutting supply costs.
They were able to cut about $1 million through more energy efficiency, reducing supply costs and not offering raises to administrators and non-teaching employees.
Cuts already made
In some areas of the school district, multiple cuts already had been made.
For example, when the new Franklin Community High School opened in 2007, 24 custodians worked there. That number has been cut to about 15, Clendening said.
In addition, Clendening and the district's director of business and operations have been reviewing every new hire for more than a year to determine if an employee who leaves should be replaced or if schools can operate without that position.
In addition to the cuts, the school district will spend more than $777,000 from its reserves.
After spending some of the reserves, the school's general fund will be left with a balance of about $1 million, and the rainy-day fund will have about $1.4 million.
Keeping those cash balances is important in case of an emergency or to pay bills when funding is short, Mercer said.
For example, at the start of the year, the school district had to pay its employees on Jan. 1, a cost of about $900,000 in total. But the school district was not set to receive more funding until Jan. 15. Without some savings to pay the bills, the school district would have had to borrow money and then pay interest, Mercer said.
Typically, economists recommend having a savings of between 5 percent and 7 percent of a budget, he said.
School board members will make the final decision about the recommended cuts at their meeting Feb. 8.
They will look at every cut and its effect, board member Darren Thompson said.
The board may not approve every recommendation, but they will review them, he said.
And board members said they are pleased with how the process has gone so far.
"It doesn't mean all the answers are the right answers. But at the end of the day, if we didn't have a process, we'd be a lot worse," Thompson said.
Every cut can have an impact on students, board member John Wales said.
Even getting rid of printers in classrooms affects students because teachers will have to leave the room to get whatever they need printed or copied, he said.
"It's wrong to say this plan will not affect students because it will. Any cut we make will affect the kids," Wales said.