Recession Takes Toll on Schools

March 29, 2010

Pocatello/Chubbuck School District Superintendent Mary Vagner has some difficult decisions to make.

Last year the school district lost $3 million in state funding. To make ends meet, officials cut back on discretionary spending and eliminated two days from the school year. They also decreased teachers’ salaries by 1 percent and increased the amount they had to pay for their benefits. It worked, but Vagner didn’t like making the cuts, especially since she believes the teachers were already underpaid.

And next year isn’t looking any brighter.

The school district will lose an additional $4.6 million for the upcoming school year, and Vagner is not sure where that money will come from.

Officials are considering holding kindergarten every other day to eliminate noon busing, but that would only save the district $62,000. There’s still $4.5 million to go.

“As we go through this process and present to the board a balanced budget we will look different,” she said. “What we will be able to do for children will be different. We’re not going to meet the level of service we’vebeen able to meet.”

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The school district is not alone. Many entities are struggling in this difficult economy. Universities are getting rid of teaching positions,increasing class sizes and considering tuition increases. County and city governments are eliminating raises and overtime, and they aren’t refilling positions when people leave.

So far, most have found ways to manage the cutbacks, but many are concerned about how far they will have to go to make ends meet — especially entities like the Pocatello/Chubbuck School District, which depends on state funding.

Hawthorne Middle School teacher Kathy Leishman lost $500 when the school district made its 1 percent salary cut. And she still has to buy classroom supplies with her own money because there has never been enough in the budget to cover it.

She spends about $300 a year to purchase paper, pens, books and decorations for her classroom. And that’s actually an improvement; she spent closer to $1,000 when she worked at the elementary school level.

“I don’t think there is an y other job out there that requires you to put in money,” Leishman said.

Although she didn’t go into teaching for the money, she’s frustrated that she is being asked to do more for less.

“We’ve had more demands put on us with No Child Left Behind and they’ve put more pressure on us. There is more work during the day, which means more to correct at the end of the day,” she said. “It just isn’t right. You don’t expect more of people and then cut their salaries.”

Vagner agrees, and she knows that teachers are reaching a breaking point.

“Educators are not well paid to begin with, but they are also very giving and empathetic people. They continue to stretch their personal budgets to support students, but I think they are going to reach the threshold this year where they won’t be able to continue to do that,” she said.

Idaho State University is struggling with similar difficulties. The university had a record spring enrollment, in part because people tend to go back to school dur ing a difficult economy. But at the same time, the university is also losing some of its state funding and is having to cut back.

“Our budget has been vastly reduced in the last two or three years. We’ve had to do a lot of strategic budget cutting,” said Provost Gary Olson, adding that they have had to cut some of the full-time temporary faculty and are looking at ways to combine programs to decrease the number of management positions. The university is also considering a 9.9 percent increase intuition.

“We’ve temporarily increased caps on some courses and tried to make better use of distance learning and online courses. We’ve done a lot of juggling so students have plenty of opportunities to take the courses they need,” Olson said.

The math department increased its class sizes from 25 to 40 to accommodate the increase in students while using a minimum of staff, said Robert Fisher Jr., department chairman. And he’s had to make other changes, as well. The department typically has $12,000 for materials and supplies, but that number dropped to $2,800 last year. Fisher started looking for additional ways to cut back and even considered getting rid of the teachers’ phone lines since e-mail has become a more popular form of communication. He decided against that strategy since he couldn’t transfer the funds to another portion of the budget,but he did institute a $5 student fee for most mat h classes. The money is being used to cover software licenses and print students’ tests, he said.

He’s concerned about how the university will be able to handle future cuts, and he’s worried about how difficult it is becoming for people to go to college, especially with tuition increases.

“We do as much as we possibly can with what we’ve got. I’m proud of that, but it’s not without stress,” he said. “I hope we can see our way through this.”

County and city governments are also struggling with budget changes due to a decrease in sales tax and state funding.

Bingham County commissioners eliminated cost-of-living increases this year and are only refilling vacated positions when necessary. They’re making other difficult decisions about critical departments, as well.

They’ve cut more than $550,000 from the Road and Bridge Department this year and are only focusing on the most important projects like limited chip sealing and bridge repairs.

Commissioners also decided not to renew a 6-year-old contract with the City of Blackfoot that required them to help cover any overages within the Blackfoot/Snake River Ambulance Service District. Officials are still trying to decide the best way to fund that district in the future.

The Bingham County Sheriff’s Office has had to make changes, as well.The department had to eliminate overtime pay and now asks deputies to take comp time instead. Although the change helps with the Justice Fund budget, which was cutback more than $1.3 million for this fiscal year, it also makes it harder to keep enough people in the office to meet the county’s needs, said Sheriff Dave Johnson.

“It really creates an issue. By law we still have to give time off for what they earn, but we lose the individual,” he said. “There is a heavier workload on those who are working to be able to cover all of the calls and demands of the services we render. It still needs to be covered, only we have less people.”

The department has also cutback on specialty trainings for crimes including arson and homicide. Deputies can only attend local events, Johnson said, adding that the department has agreed to host some of the trainings just so they can get a few deputies in for fr ee.

Although the department isn’t running the way he would like it to be,Johnson said his employees are working hard to meet the county’s needs.

“We’ve had to tighten our belt just like everyone else in the county,”he said. “(But) we’re doing the best we can with what we have.”