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Redondo Beach News
by Kevin Cody
“As a former teacher, I find this all very moving,” newly elected Redondo school board president Arlene Staich said as she struggled to control her emotions during Tuesday night’s school board meeting.
Staich’s comment followed nearly two hours of compelling and often emotional testimony from department heads arguing against the cuts proposed by district assistant superintendents Tom Cox and Chris Chavez.
The meeting ended with the board failing to agree on any cuts, despite having set themselves a May 13 deadline to have at least $1.5 million in cuts in place. Cox warned the board that it may need to cut as much as $2.5 million by next year, depending on the amount the district loses in state funding due to the state’s financial difficulties.
Carl Clark, another newly elected board member, attempted to jump-start the cost cutting Tuesday night by identifying $282,000 in cuts from the Cox/Chavez proposal that he could support.
Eliminating the computer systems director would save the district $92,000 a year, Clark noted.
And throw the district into chaos, responded Gilbert Chang, whose job Clark proposed eliminating. “Prior to my arrival four years ago, the district was in a state of technological meltdown,” Chang said. “You were purchasing cheap clones. Computer data, including grades, wasn’t backed up. Teachers and office workers didn’t have technical support.
“I established an information services program that has stabilized the system, and I elicited thousands of dollars in donated services and equipment from CISCO, Verizon and Apple,” Chang added.
Discussion about eliminating Chang’s position ended with member Rebecca Sargent asking him to prepare a flow chart of his department.
Clark’s efforts to win support for Cox’s and Chavez’s recommendation to eliminate the head of maintenance, for a $55,000 savings, met a similar fate. Maintenance supervisor Al Duhon pointed out that the recommendation included having school custodian’s report directly to the school principals. “Does this mean the principals will be responsible for checking fire extinguishers each month, locking and unlocking classrooms, and getting up in the middle of the night when there is an emergency. I don’t think the principals want these responsibilities,” Duhon said.
Duhon pointed out that the principals would also be responsible for numerous state mandated programs, such as one that regulates the solvents that can be used, and another outlining the appropriate response to blood born pathogens in the event someone on campus bleeds. “I know the only way to reduce costs is to reduce people,” Duhon said. “But I think I should be the one to make the cuts. I was with the airlines for 33 years. I went through two mergers and staff reductions. I know how to do this.”
Speaking in support of Duhon, Washington School principal Jeff Bordofsky credited the maintenance supervisor with facilitating the “monumental task” of moving the contents of 24 classrooms during his campus’ recent modernization.
Robert Hadley, president of the classified employee’s union, accused the board of “taking the easy way out” by cutting jobs. “The hard way is to rally the community to raise the money for the schools,” Hadley said.
A clearly frustrated Jane Diehl, the board’s third newly elected board member, said at the end of the two-hour discussion, “We need to make some cuts on this list. Is there anything we can agree on? How about the proposal to eliminate paying for fingerprinting new employees?”
The proposal, which would save the district $10,000 annually, was approved by acclamation.
The board also listed as “probable”, the elimination of the public information office for an annual savings of $180,000, and the elimination of one of three assistant superintendents positions. When the public information officer Jerry Klein was asked if he wished to address the board, he answered, “No thank you.”
Assistant superintendent Sandy Clifton-Bacon volunteered that her position could be eliminated, but only if her staff remained intact.
Other proposed reductions to be discussed at Thursdays meeting include eliminating school lights for after school sports ($100,000) reducing buses for sports teams ($40,000), eliminating the middle school sports teams ($15,000), eliminating the librarian ($70,000) and eliminating music in the elementary schools ($200,000).
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