When one is anxious about something, one paces. Superintendent
Alan Nishino, School Board President Don Moody and board member
Mike Hickey took their pacing over the district’s budget
– and how the state’s indecision affects Morgan Hill’s schools –
to Sacramento.
Sacramento
When one is anxious about something, one paces.
Superintendent Alan Nishino, School Board President Don Moody and board member Mike Hickey took their pacing over the district’s budget – and how the state’s indecision affects Morgan Hill’s schools – to Sacramento.
As backdoor negotiations on how to close the $41 billion state budget deficit continue, the three Morgan Hill Unified School District officials met with a representative from Assemblyman Bill Monning’s office as well as state Superintendent Jack O’Connell to push the district’s three preferred budget ideas.
Of the ideas in Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s budget proposal, Nishino said the three most advantageous for the district are the idea of allowing flexibility in using categorical funds, or funds typically only available for a specific purpose; having a longer payback period when dipping into the district’s 3 percent reserve, from one year to up to five years; and postponing textbook replacements.
Of the flexibility option, Nishino said, “I don’t like it, but that’s an option we can have,” which summarized his feelings on all the options.
Nishino said it was good to have face-face conversation at the state capitol because that way legislators – or, as in this case, their aides – can ask questions about seemingly good ideas, such as cutting back the days in a school year from 180 to 175.
“Going in there and speaking with them, I can tell them about teacher contracts and different issues that come up with that,” Nishino said.
The district’s top official has a longtime friendship with the state’s top school official, which has afforded the district more time with O’Connell, both said.
“My relationship with him helps because I can tell him what’s going on from the grassroots level,” Nishino said. “He can get a better idea from 30,000 feet up what it means from the ground level.”
Still, there’s only so much O’Connell can do.
“They were very thoughtful, and shared their district’s concerns,” O’Connell said of the Morgan Hill officials in an interview following their Tuesday morning meeting.
Like the officials representing the nearly 1,000 school districts across California, O’Connell said Nishino and company expressed their concerns over the uncertainty of having a budget that’s not finalized while facing deadlines for action.
“All the districts want are some parameters, they’re saying, ‘Give us the magnitude of the fiscal challenge,'” O’Connell said. “March 15 is the next huge deadline, when layoff notices will have to be sent out.”
Many of the decisions were unpalatable for him, like removing the K-3 class size reduction program, which O’Connell penned as a legislator.
O’Connell pointed out that of the trifecta on the chopping block – health and human services, prisons and education – education was a way to reduce costs in the other two through prevention.
“Public education is a sound investment,” he said. “It’s an investment in a healthier more productive citizenry in the future.”
O’Connell’s advice to district officials like Nishino are to make the least painful cuts first, to get them out of the way: putting off purchasing new textbooks and hardware, and foregoing professional development.
“Every little bit helps,” he said.
First-term Assemblyman Bill Monning (D-Carmel) said it would be nearly impossible to settle the budget without having a negative affect on schools.
“Unfortunately, a lot of the proposals have not spared education from cuts,” Monning said. “The Democratic caucus would like to minimize the impact as much as possible.”
Monning said that the Republican caucus’s December budget proposal simply cut $39 billion from the state budget, which included cutting education funding by one-fifth.
“We can come up with a solution that doesn’t cut public education by 20 percent,” he said.
Monning said he was hopeful that the negotiations would lead to a compromise that included both cuts and new revenue, or taxes, to close the state budget gap.
