Scottsdale schools face classroom cuts again

• The Scottsdale school district%27s budget cuts will affect the classroom next year
• The district closed a school and reduced art%2C music and physical-education classes
• The district will ask voters for a third time to approve an override this fall

For the second year in a row, budget cuts will directly affect the classroom in the Scottsdale Unified School District.

The governing board adopted a preliminary budget June 3 and will vote on the final budget later this month.

This school year, more than $9 million in budget cuts led the district to eliminate more than 40 teaching positions, which raised classroom sizes by about two students.

For 2014-15, students in grades kindergarten through five will have art, music and physical education less often and will have early release one day a week.

Here is the breakdown of the 2014-15 budget:

The 2014-15 budget is about $143 million, down from the $148 million budget of this year. That's mainly due to reduced revenue from an override. Voters last November rejected renewing the property tax that funds the override, so the district will get $4.2 million less from that next school year.

Revenue also will decline by more than $2 million because of lower enrollment, with a loss of about 400 students.

And several costs are increasing, such as utilities and contracted services, plus the district must contribute a higher amount to the Arizona State Retirement System.

Those changes created a $9 million budget gap. Administrators applied money from three funds:

• The district has about $2.8 million to carry forward from the current year's budget. That's money that was saved when jobs were left open for a time before being filled, or when supplies cost less than budgeted.

• Scottsdale will receive about $1.6 million more from the state than last year because of a court-ordered increase in inflation funding for public schools.

• Because the district earned an A grade from the state Department of Education, it will get $485,000 in performance pay, which is new for 2014-15.

That left a $4.2 million budget gap that the district closed with the following steps:

• Cut: About 30 teaching jobs in art, music and physical education, classes known as "specials." Savings: About $1.5 million.

This means that K-5 students will have one of those classes every other day rather than every day.

In addition, because the classroom teachers used the time that students were at "specials" for preparation, the district had to find another way to give the teachers prep time, as required in their contracts.

The elementary schools will dismiss at 1 p.m. every Wednesday next year, rather than 3:15 p.m., and teachers will use that time to collaborate, prepare lessons, grade papers and do other work.

The K-5 students who attend K-8 schools will have an extended lunch or snack time during which their classroom teacher can prepare.

• Cut: 14 administrative jobs. Savings: $850,000.

The jobs included the director of special education, executive director of community engagement (who handles marketing), the clinical services coordinator, the building services director, a construction inspector, an accountant and two executive administrative assistants. Some of the jobs were vacant. Associate Superintendent Jeff Thomas told the board that he is leaving in December.

• Change: phased retirement. Savings: $450,000.

School districts save money by rehiring retired employees because they pay the workers a reduced salary. The employee comes out ahead because he or she collects a pension on top of the reduced salary.

But there's one drawback: State law requires that when employees retire and begin collecting a pension, they must wait a full year before returning to work in a district. That's a risk that dissuades potential participants because Scottsdale does not guarantee that a job will be open for them after a year.

Under the new system that was approved in February, that risk is eliminated. The employee can retire from Scottsdale and then become an employee of a third-party firm retained by the district, Educational Services Inc., which makes them eligible to return immediately because they are not district staff.

More than 20 employees took advantage of the new system and their reduced salaries will save $450,000.

• Cut: 8 teaching positions. Savings: $400,000.

When enrollment falls, schools eliminate teaching positions to make up for the lost per-pupil funding. For 2014-15, Scottsdale is cutting eight classroom teaching jobs.

• Cut: Closing facilities. Savings: $250,000.

This was among the most controversial cuts this year because much of that savings will come from closing the Tonalea Elementary School campus.

The Tonalea community protested the closure, asking the district to instead try to find the money to repair their buildings, which are more than 50 years old and badly in need of maintenance. The district decided to move all the students and staff together to the Oak campus, which this past year housed a preschool and other district programs. It will be renamed Tonalea Elementary School. The old Tonalea campus will be shut down and the district will save money on reduced utilities and maintenance.

In addition, Scottsdale is shutting down more than 70 classrooms in schools across the district and closing its main district office, called the Education Center, at 3811 N. 44th St. in Phoenix.

The board, at its June 3 meeting, voted to put the sale of the Education Center on the ballot this fall. Voters must approve the plan to sell the site. Proceeds from the sale cannot be put into the main operating budget and instead must be used for capital needs, such as building repairs and maintenance.

• Cut: bus routes and miles. Savings: $200,000.

In addition to saving money because of lower fuel prices, the transportation department has reduced the number of bus stops and daily mileage. Superintendent David Peterson said that in January, the district's buses were averaging 11,133 miles a day with 5,205 riders. In April, the average daily mileage dropped to 9,399 and ridership increased to 5,549.

"So we reduced our route miles by almost 2,000 a day and we picked up our ridership by more than 300 students," he said.

• Transfer: $1 million.

The district has about $12 million in its workers' compensation fund and will ask the trust that handles the money if it can use $1 million of the sum for its premium payment. That will free $1 million in the operating budget that was previously earmarked for the payment.

These cuts leave a surplus of about $424,000. Scottsdale plans to use $210,000 of that for improvements to its middle-school math program. The remaining $214,000 might be spent on Scottsdale's new middle-school honors program.

Override vote

The Scottsdale Unified School District governing board voted June 3 to put an override on the ballot this fall.

The 15 percent override would combine and renew two existing property taxes.

Voters have rejected that move the past two years, with the override defeated by 327 votes in 2013.

If the override passes it would generate $18.8 million per year, allowing the district to lower class sizes and restore art, music and physical-education classes, which were scaled back for next school year because of the last override defeat and resulting decline in revenue.