School Board Approves BAC’s Plan B Recommendation, Amounting to Nearly a Million Dollars in Cuts

Big Bear Valley, CA — Though it is not yet a done deal, the Board of Trustees for the Bear Valley Unified School District did implement additional cuts to school programs in adopting the fiscal year 2010/2011 budget on June 23. The Board adopted the budget as it was presented to them in a June 21^st budget workshop—and this includes the Budget Advisory Committee’s Plan B recommendation, one of three that received much discussion during the school board’s April 28 budget meeting. As outlined in the Budget Advisory Committee’s Plan B and adopted, an additional $930,000 in cuts will be made to BVUSD; this includes the one percent pay cut taken by classified staff and management, the freeze on certificated staff’s step and column advancement, and seven furlough days for all three groups, amounting to salary reductions of 4½ percent. Additional reductions included in Plan B are as follows: a $55,000 reduction in routine maintenance for BVUSD, $20,000 reduction to school site budgets, a $38,000 reduction to Big Bear High’s athletic travel budget (from what had been $86,000), the elimination of BBMS athletic travel, elimination of the strings program, elimination of the intervention programs (amounting to $200,000), elimination of board stipends, reductions to adult education and the high school exit exam program, the elimination of GATE and two other programs, and a $20,400 reduction to the professional development budget. As explained by the district’s Director of Business Services Walter Con, “There was a lot of discussion about potentially revisiting some of these cuts at the July 7 meeting, in particular the strings program and school realignment.” Superintendent Dr. Nancy Wright will be reconvening the Budget Advisory Committee (comprised of school personnel, union representatives and parent Mary Kelso) as of August, to continue to look for solutions to the funding crisis. But, all told, relays Con, “The outlook for funding to K-12 education remains bleak, and it is most likely the district will have to make additional cuts to maintain fiscal solvency.”