- April 26, 2024
-
-
Loading
Loading
The School Board approved a list of budget cuts, totaling more than $3.5 million. Next step: negotiations with the teachers union.
A list of $3,558,690 worth of budget cuts was approved by the Flagler County School Board Tuesday, March 15, before a standing-room-only crowd at the Government Services Building.
“I’m sorry,” School Board member Colleen Conklin told the crowd at the close of the night. “If you think we sit up here and take anything lightly, we don’t. None of these are easy decisions, and I’m just sorry.”
Other members of the board expressed regret, as well.
“It’s the hardest job I’ve certainly ever encountered,” Superintendent Janet Valentine said.
The recommended reductions include 42 lost teaching positions, not including two reduced counseling jobs and reduced Pathways staff. A combined $512,000 will also be taken away from existing teachers’ payroll by reducing their days worked in a year.
“The employees are the strength of the district,” board member Andy Dance said. “(The district) tried as hard as they could, as long as they could to (protect them).”
Should the state’s proposed budget cuts take place, Flagler Schools may only be able to maintain the necessities, Valentine suggested last week in the county’s first State of Education Parent Forum.
But parents, teachers and students of all grade levels were present Tuesday, March 15, to air their concerns to the board. For nearly an hour, a stream of residents took the podium to explain why losing time in the school day is counterproductive. A parent was opposed to the idea that a son could lose his Pathways experience; another parent opposed having a daughter’s Phoenix Academy career possibly be compromised by the alternative school’s proposed relocation.
“Moving them will destroy the program,” Cheryl Perry, a Phoenix Academy teacher, told the board.
There has to be another way — that was the consensus in the extended, and sometimes tear-filled, public-comment portion of the night.
Others not present at the board meeting agree, and also suggest there is room for the cuts.
“The school can make major cuts without necessarily cutting the number of teachers or affecting the quality of education,” said Tom Lawrence, chairman of the Flagler County Tea Party Movement. “Their first response is, ‘No, we can’t do that.’ We don’t buy that. We still think there’s room for improvement in their systems. So we respect that fact that (Gov. Rick) Scott is challenging them to do it, without affecting the quality of education.”
Katie Hansen, president of the Flagler County Educators Association, echoed that sentiment on Tuesday night. “(We have to find) any ways we can to save money that don’t hurt people and their livelihood,” she said “If we all just take a little hit … we can get through this. If we don’t, we’re all going to lose.”
But Colleen Conklin, for one, doesn’t see another way.
“Were all fighting amongst ourselves for all the wrong reasons,” she said. “The money’s not there … And you can hate all of us up here … Unfortunately, we have to do with what we have been given.”
