Anchorage School District administrators are proposing a 2012-2013 budget today that is $6.2 million smaller than this year's, and about $20 million short of continuing the same level of services.
Next year's plan calls for spending $726.8 million, compared with $733.1 million this year. If the School Board agrees, class sizes will rise, summer school will disappear, special education staff will be trimmed, and some of the same positions that narrowly escaped being cut last year, such as graduation coaches who intervene on behalf of students at risk of not graduating, will be gone.
While some positions would be added, 88 net positions would be eliminated -- some maintenance workers, a few librarians and some teacher assistants, for example.
"I don't like this budget, but I think it's as responsible as we could make it," school Superintendent Carol Comeau said in an interview.
The district serves roughly 49,000 students.
The School Board begins considering the proposal in a meeting from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. today at school district headquarters at Northern Lights Boulevard and Boniface Parkway.
The total is based on expected flat funding from the state, which pays about half of local school costs, and a 1 percent increase in local tax revenues. Local taxes pay about a third of school expenses. The rest comes from federal grants and other sources.
While revenues are down, salaries and benefits are up by $14.6 million.
Other rising costs:
• The district also chose to add $1.2 million for a program called "Response to Instruction," a system for checking whether students are learning critical skills, and adapting instruction to fill in gaps.
• The district wants to add $967,987 to an equipment fund to be used for such things as replacing aging school buses.
• The administration wants to absorb the cost of paying for 81 classroom teachers that were funded through a $7.6 million federal jobs bill that runs out this school year. Other positions would be cut to make up for it.
A big problem, said Comeau and the district's chief financial officer, Chad Stiteler, is that the amount of state money dedicated to schools isn't known until the Legislature adjourns and the governor signs off on state appropriations, in early summer, but long after the district must complete its budget.
As a result, the district this year and last year had to propose heavy-duty cuts. When the state adds money late in the game, drastic cuts are sometimes reversed. The system undermines the district's credibility, Comeau said.
That happened last year, when the state came up with $9.7 million that hadn't been expected. In August, the district reinstated some teaching positions, $2.8 million to replace computers, and other jobs and programs that had been eliminated.
With no increases expected in state funds, the Anchorage district isn't the only one in Alaska facing cuts this year.
Fairbanks superintendent Pete Lewis warned earlier this month that the district there expects a $14 million shortfall, the Fairbanks News Miner reported. The Fairbanks budget proposal is due out by Feb. 1. The Juneau School District superintendent recently announced that 66 positions could be slashed next school year, according to the Juneau Empire.
The Anchorage district changed its presentation of the budget this year by not including one gigantic expense that had been part of prior budgets: an unfunded liability for the state retirement programs that cover district employees. It amounts to $100 million-plus. But the state pays it. The school district in the past included the number in its budget total, but now has taken it out to match the way the municipality prepares its budget. The district also removed the liability numbers from past budgets for comparison purposes.
Here’s a list of some of the proposed cuts:
• .5-student increase in class size for third grade, 1-student increase in grades 4-6, $1.4 million savings.
• 1-student class size increase for
middle-schoolers, $908,242.
• 1.5 student class size increase for high schools, $2.3 million.
• Six elementary school counselor positions and four librarian positions, about $950,000.
• Thirty-five special education positions, including nine secondary counselor positions, $2.8 million.
• Seven graduation coaches, $641,912.
• Ten middle school career guides, $956,044.
• Summer school elimination: elementary schools, $1.1 million; middle schools, $459,791; high schools,
$1.2 million.
• Replacement computers, $2.3 million.
• Six maintenance positions, $535,457.
• Three warehouse maintenance positions, $286,421.
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