Last week a school board work group discussed best and worst case scenarios in response to Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s proposed budget, including layoffs and cutting programs such as art, physical education and music.
Based on last year’s budget, the Haines Borough School District was expecting to receive $2.2 million in state funding for 2020, but under Dunleavy’s proposal it will now receive $1.7 million, a cut of nearly $600,000.
At even a 4 percent cut, superintendent Roy Getchell said that layoffs would be necessary.
After talking with administrators around the state, Getchell said schools are realistically expecting to cut their budget by between 3 and 10 percent. He presented school board members with a cutback scenario for a flat budget, a 4 percent reduction, an 8 percent reduction and the “doomsday” 29 percent cut Dunleavy put forward.
“The budget as proposed is not popular, which tells us there’s going to be changes as it goes through,” Getchell said.
In the best case scenario of no cuts from last year’s budget, called flat funding, state allocated money would still be reduced by $394,000 based on a projected decrease in student enrollment for 2020. To make up the funding difference, Getchell suggested reducing employee costs based on students’ needs, and the budget for substitute teachers. The 2020 budget will eliminate the mentoring contract and moving expenses on last year’s budget for Getchell, whose contract in Haines began in 2018.
A 4 percent reduction, based on the expected enrollment number, would cut $486,000 from the 2020 budget, Getchell said. He brainstormed cutting personnel costs by $65,000 and expenses by $27,000 by looking at maintenance supplies, custodial supplies and legal services.
An 8 percent reduction with reduced student enrollment would slash state funding by $578,000, requiring additional personnel cuts. “That’s at least two teachers,” Getchell said, depending on their pay and position.
The 29 percent proposed budget loss would reduce state funds by $599,000 in base student spending. A previous article quoted 23 percent reductions at $500,000 in per student funding, but Getchell said the number has increased by calculating fewer intensive students, which are counted higher in the formula used to set base student funding.
In the worst case scenario, teachers would be eliminated based on student needs, the substitute teacher budget would be cut down and all non-core classes like art, physical education and music, would be scrutinized, Getchell said.
The fact that we’re saying, ‘Oh, we hope it’s only eight percent’ is really crummy and I hate the fact that this is where we all are,” board president Anne Marie Palmieri said.
Cut estimates do not include the expected loss of funding in 2020 from Senate Bill 142. The legislature allocated $20 million across Alaska districts in 2019, with $44,000 coming to Haines. For 2020, the bill allocated $30 million across the state, with $67,000 to Haines. That funding will likely be eliminated, Getchell said.
Dunleavy’s proposal also eliminates capital improvement projects already approved. The school roof replacement and the high school gym locker room projects that were approved from Gov. Walker in December hang in limbo, Palmieri said.
Additionally, funding was pulled from the state’s school debt reimbursement funding that supports large capital projects. The state has given $900,000 to the Haines Borough every year since it built the $17 million school in 2005. If subsidized funding is cut, the full cost burden will fall on the borough for the remaining seven years of their payment program.
Dunleavy also proposed eliminating funding for early childhood programs in the state’s Department of Education and Early Development, money that pays for student enrollment at Haines Head Start and its Parents as Teachers program, which sends staff into homes to work with parents and children.
The Haines Borough school board plans to post a fact sheet on the school’s website, establish budgetary priorities for three different budget schemes (flat, 4 percent, 8 percent) and send members to a legislative lobbying session in April.