Oregon Trail schools face tough choices

-Gus Jarvis
The Sandy Post

Teachers union could be asked to forgo salary hikes
With a projected $3.5 million shortfall in the 2011-12 budget, the Oregon Trail School District faces some tough decisions before it finalizes its budget in the coming weeks.
The revenue shortfall is based on the state allocation of $5.7 billion for K-12 education in Oregon over the next two years, which Gov. John Kitzhaber signed off on earlier this month.
Oregon Trail Business Director Tim Belanger said the district has a target budget reduction of $2.7 million for the 2011-12 school year, which still leaves the district $800,000 short of balancing the budget.At this juncture, Belanger said, approximately half of this remaining shortfall will be funded from the district’s budget reserves, leaving $400,000 in reductions the district hasn’t yet firmly identified.
“Our hope is to do as minimal riffing as possible,” Superintendent Shelley Redinger said. “We have a number of different plans. It could be a program or different people. We are moving the puzzle pieces around to see where there is less pain in reductions.”
A big piece to the district’s budget puzzle is whether the Wy’East Education Association (the teachers union) is willing to forgo any teacher pay increases this year. Right now, the district is figuring the budget with a base assumption of a 2-percent salary increase based on past increases, but it hopes the association will agree now is not the time for any increases.
“There is no question that needs to be a part of the solution,” Belanger said. “We need to stop salary escalation. When all is said and done, we are respectfully requesting that all staff come and do the same work for the same compensation for the same period of time so we can get the budget back into parity.”
Belanger said the district has asked the association to offer its proposal by the end of this week in regard to salary increases so the district may plan for a budget meeting May 10.
“Either way, we will know what they are thinking, and we will plan that way for the meeting,” he said.
As the association continues to prepare its plan, President Lanning Russell said the organization understands the funding situation for schools statewide is dire and does not originate, primarily, with the choices made at the Oregon Trail School District.
“The schools have few options,” Russell said. “The dialogue is no longer how to maintain programs and academic sufficiency, but how to stay open and solvent.”
With 80 percent of school expenditures going to personnel, Russell went on to say that the association understands the dimensions of the crisis.
“WEA is working with the district to identify the least objectionable mix of school day cuts, school closures, staff cuts, program cuts, salary and benefit and other cuts that will protect the students, parents and employees of the Oregon Trail community to the greatest extent possible,” he said. “Beyond that, the solution must come from the voters and taxpayers of Oregon.”
And while a hold on teacher salary increases will help ease the budget shortfall, Belanger said that alone would not make up the entire deficit. No matter how the pieces of the puzzle fit together, both Redinger and Belanger agree that the district faces tough choices.

Tags: Budget Cuts, forgo salary hikes, Oregon Trail School District, Teachers Union

This entry was posted on Friday, April 29th, 2011 at 8:50 am and is filed under City of Sandy, Informational. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.