A perfect fiscal storm
Idaho teachers find there may be no shelter from this monetary squall
By JESSICA KELLER
ARGUS OBSERVER
Sunday, March 22, 2009 12:52 AM PDT
PAYETTE—It’s raining. It’s raining hard, but Idaho officials’ reluctance to tap into the state’s education rainy day fund has some area teachers and administrators wondering if those top executives and legislators are stuck in another weather system.
To help drive home that point, Payette and other area teachers joined in a statewide effort to protest proposed cuts to education by state officials.
Lori Steiniker, a Payette High School special education teacher and Payette Education Association president, said the Idaho Education Association came up with “No Cuts to Education Day,” slated Monday. The “No Cuts to Education Day,” is designed to give teachers an opportunity to protest broad cuts to the state education budget by wearing Band-Aids and posting signs calling for state lawmakers to use federal stimulus money and rainy day funds. Since spring break began for many area schools Friday, local teachers chose Thursday to sport the adornments. Steiniker said the message behind the Band-Aids is, “No Band-Aid can repair cuts to a child’s education.”
“By making all these cuts, we’re really hurting our children by increasing class size and reducing resources,” Steiniker said.
Monday, the Idaho Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee will set the appropriations for public schools. Before committee members will be Gov. Butch Otter’s recommendation to cut educators’ salaries by 5 percent, as part of a plan for all state employees, as well as implement Idaho State Department of Education Superintendent Tom Luna’s $62 million savings proposal.
Steiniker said local and state educators believe, rather than leaving $40 million of federal stimulus funds that could go to education untouched, the state Legislature should use the money and money in the state’s rainy day fund to shore up education funding.
“Well, we think they should use some of the rainy day fund because it’s there,” Steiniker said.
She said the IEA presented a plan to the Idaho Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee about three weeks ago to use both federal stimulus and rainy day funds that would support education in Idaho for three years, which she hopes state legislators will follow.
“Our districts around here are already hurting because of loss of enrollment, and our budgets are already tight,” Steiniker said. “It’s raining now, so let’s use that money that’s been appropriated instead of hurting our children.”
In Fruitland, Superintendent Alan Felgenhauer agreed now would be a perfect time to utilize the state’s rainy day fund because it’s definitely raining.
He suggested perhaps, instead of rainy day fund, “end of the world fund” would be a more appropriate name because apparently that is what state legislators are waiting for before they tap into it.
As it is, Felgenhauer said he does not think the budget forecast looks promising.
“We’re expecting the worst,” he said. “It’s not looking too promising for the state. It doesn’t sound like they’re going to give us much of anything.”
Felgenhauer said school district officials are anticipating the district could get a 4-to 8- percent reduction in state funding for the 2009-2010 budget year. Just Luna’s proposal would mean approximately $375,000 less for the district, but it could lose up to $500,000 to $600,000.
“We’ve been spending the last couple of months trying to figure out what cuts we can make, and we’re still working on it,” Felgenhauer said. “I don’t think it’s a matter of if we’re going to get cut. I think it’s a matter of how much.”
He said it sounds like when the Idaho Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee sets the education appropriations this week it will likely approve education budget cuts including a salary funding decrease in the range of 3 to 3.5 percent.
That means school districts will receive however much less in funding, and it is up to the school districts to decide how to make those reductions in their budget, whether it’s to negotiate with teachers unions over salary decreases or to cut staff altogether.
Felgenhauer said staff cuts could become a reality as 85 percent of the school district budget is personnel.
“If you’re looking at a $500,000 to $600,000 loss in state revenue, there’s no way you can completely offset that without looking at some personnel cuts,” he said. “It’s just not going to be possible.”
Felgenhauer said a couple of different scenarios are possible, including not refilling the positions of people already leaving or retiring, but he is not sure whether that would make up all the savings necessary.
“So we’ve got some ideas, actually lots of ideas, but for right now we’re just waiting,” he said.
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Out West wrote on Mar 22, 2009 7:37 AM: