Public gets details on MUSD budget cuts

Parents attending two meetings Wednesday on budget cuts in the Maricopa Unified School District learned what the tuition would be to keep all-day kindergarten and what savings could be derived by closing an elementary or middle school.

The district is facing a $1 million budget shortfall for the 2013-2014 school year.

Superintendent Steve Chestnut met with about 30 parents in the morning at the district office and in the evening at Santa Cruz Elementary School.

To continue all-day kindergarten – half day would remain free – would be $130 a month per student. Chestnut cited the numbers for closing a school, using the examples of Santa Cruz and Desert Wind Middle School. A specific school has not been designated for possible closure.

Closing Santa Cruz could save $317,000 and closing Desert Wind – moving the sixth graders to an elementary school – would save the district $838,000. 

Chestnut pointed out if the city’s population grew, a closed school could reopen within a couple of years.

The projected maintenance and operations budget for the 2013-2014 fiscal year is approximately $32 million, about a $1 million less than the $33 million the district will have spent by the end of June. 

Jason and Diana Schalow, parents of a high school student and another child about to enter kindergarten, said they advocated closing a middle school, but only if class size is addressed. 

“Overall, my biggest frustration is that in our community so many parents take their kids out of the district,” Diana Schalow said.

Jason Schalow said the state’s open enrollment and free transportation policy “kills smalls bedroom communities like this one.”

Michael West, a parent with two children enrolled in the district, said closing a school and changing kindergarten likely would need to be done.
However, West said he would hate to see Desert Wind close because his son went there and excelled.

West also said the district should have been able to see the problem coming giving the continual decrease in state funding and declining district enrollment. 

Instead of rolling surplus funds into the next year to close budget gaps, he said, the district should have been attempting to address the problem early on.

Chestnut said reduced state funding is the primary reason for the shortage.

“This is the main problem, is state funding from the Legislature,” Chestnut said during the morning session. “They’re basically paying 92 percent of our operating budget and federal funds make up the rest.”

Chestnut said 700 students a day are bussed out of the district, which exacerbates the problem because state funding is largely based on student enrollment.

“The state of Arizona quit paying for all-day kindergarten three years ago as a result of the down economy,” Chestnut said, pointing out why the district has to consider cuts now.

Although he said the district’s decision to continue with all-day kindergarten was “noble,” he also said, “It’s kind of come down to the fact where, in my judgment, we can’t afford to keep doing this.” 

Currently, the 20 teachers who work in kindergarten are each paid approximately $48,000 a year, including benefits, for a salary cost of $960,000. By changing to a half-day kindergarten, those costs get slashed in half because only half as many teachers are required. 

The tuition, which would pay for half the cost of five certified teachers and assumes 25 children per classroom would be $130 per month. 
Attendees at both sessions split into groups to discuss the options.

Common concerns about half-day kindergarten with a possible tuition-based full-day option included pupils leaving the district to attend all-day kindergarten for free in the Kyrene School District. 

The Kyrene district uses override funding to pay for its kindergarten program.

Parents also were concerned that half day would not prepare kindergartners to meet first-grade standards; larger class sizes would translate into stressed kindergarten teachers; disabled and English Second Language students would not receive the attention they need; and it would not close the budget gap.

The second option, to close a school, would save the district in energy and staffing costs.

Teachers as well as classified staff – nonteaching positions such as custodians – and possibly administrators would be cut as well.

***ADVERTISEMENT***The total amount the district will need to cut it somewhat up in the air. 

“There are some wild cards in here that are impossible to plan for,” Chestnut said. “The Legislature always finishes late, and you really can’t factor in what they’re going to do.”

Since 85 percent of the district’s costs are tied up in staffing costs, ranging from custodians to administrators, few options are available to implement steep budget cuts.

“Obviously we’re a labor-intensive organization, so that doesn’t really give you a lot of flexibility,” Chestnut said. 

When one attendee asked why administrators couldn’t just take a pay cut, Chestnut said that could be considered as well. 

He said it was a “very common” measure for school districts to take and that he had even taken a pay cut as an administrator in Washington.
Chestnut said, however, that would not close the budget gap.

Several groups, during both sessions, suggested it might be a better fit for sixth graders to move to an elementary school, and closing a middle school would allow the district to focus more on the remaining middle school.

The next meeting is March 20 at 10 a.m. in the MUSD administration building and the second session 7 p.m. at Maricopa Elementary School.