School board deals with personnel and bus needs amid financial crunch

Funding issues came to the table at Wednesday’s meeting of the Maricopa Unified School District’s governing board.

According to Director of Business Services Mark Busch, the district is currently 200 students shy of the average daily membership (ADM) needed to obtain additional staff. However, staffing and transportation needs exist. The recommendation to the board involved using builder donation funds to fill 29.6 staff positions and to lease three additional buses.

Board member Tim White showed his concern for depleting the Builder Donation Fund. “We’re robbing ourselves of any protection we might have in the future.”

Busch agreed that builder funds were coming in at “a trickle.”

Prolonged discussion ended in the board’s approval to purchase outright the three buses plus hire drivers. Busch noted the “growth in athletic areas,” adding that the current number of buses is “not enough to cover all runs going everywhere.” Purchasing the buses, which will have underneath, pass through storage compartments, will cost about $384,000 while a lease agreement would have been $90,000 per year.

Hiring additional personnel, four part-time site coordinators for the After School Program as well as a reduction in instructor pay for that program, was tabled until further information is available to the board.

Three part-time food service positions will be filled as well as 10 paraprofessionals for the special education department. An additional bus driver will be hired for the After School Program to bus students from the Santa Cruz campus. An administrative assistant for Curriculum and Instruction will be hired only if funded through grants or Title I or IIA monies.

During the Call to the Public former district employee and parent Kim Calderone spoke against the reduction in After School Program instructor pay; she also chided the board in reference to their recent strategic planning meeting. “I thought you would already have a vision in place. I don’t see it, and I didn’t see it when I worked here,” said Calderone.

The next meeting of the board will be at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 26, at the high school in Room 1.