School officials consider cuts

Clark County School District Superintendent Walt Rulffes has no idea how to return state funds that have already been spent.

Lincoln County Superintendent Clark Hardy is trying to remain calm in the face of a potential $500,000 blow to his rural school district.

State Superintendent of Schools Keith Rheault is using the L-word: layoffs.

Across the state, public education leaders are scrambling to identify the cost and the consequences of Gov. Jim Gibbons' decision Friday to include schools in statewide budget reductions of 4.5 percent. Education funding, initially declared exempt from the cuts, may be reduced by $96 million.

"We're halfway through the year," Rulffes said Monday. "We're going to have to cut twice as much to make up for that."

Rheault is arranging a Wednesday teleconference for all Nevada superintendents to discuss what the cuts may look like and where they might occur. That's a prelude to a Thursday meeting between Gibbons and the superintendents.

"We're trying to come up with numbers now," Rheault said. "That way, we'll all have the same numbers on Thursday when we meet with the governor and his staff."

Delaying the creation of empowerment schools nets $8.9 million. Putting off the expansion of all-day kindergarten programs would save another $13.2 million. Those would be cuts to programs that aren't yet up and running, Rheault said. Students and staff wouldn't be directly affected.

But those two rollbacks of legislative action taken earlier this year don't put public schools even one-third of the way toward achieving the reduction target of $96 million. That means looking at existing programs for cuts, Rheault said. And since programs are run by people, that's likely to result in layoffs.

"We're looking at all the one-shot money as well," Rheault said.

That's proving to be problematic though, since much of the one-shot money has already been spent. For instance, about $40 million in remediation money was earmarked during the session for schools with struggling students. That money was sent out before school started and has likely already been spent on programs and materials. Schools aren't in a position to return it, Rheault said.

Rulffes is caught up in that as well. In a Dec. 14 letter from Gibbons announcing the 4.5 percent cuts in education, one highlighted item was $14.6 million for the remodeling of district food service kitchens. That project has already been completed.

"We can't cut what we've already spent," Rulffes said.

The district is seeking clarification on the governor's time frame for cuts, and also what qualifies as a cut. District Chief Financial Officer Jeff Weiler already has prepared documentation showing that due to expected enrollment shortfalls for 2008 and 2009, the district will not be receiving $61.9 million in state funding that it was projected to get. On Monday, Weiler and Rulffes were unclear if that counted toward the education cuts.

It doesn't, Rheault said. That's already been factored in. The $96 million in cuts will be in addition to savings from enrollment shortfalls.

Gibbons asked superintendents in his letter to come to Thursday's meeting prepared to discuss a total of $300 million in biennial appropriations, including reserve funds set aside by districts such as Clark and Washoe County for emergencies. Also included on Gibbons' list of possible budget reductions:

• $117 million for school equipment;

• $1.5 million in appropriations for retirees, which education officials said would have been returned to the state in any case;

• $26.8 million for a Clark County business resource data system, of which only $7 million remains unspent;

• $1 million set aside by Clark to cover unfunded costs resulting from federal No Child Left Behind mandates.

"The state will not be able to meet reduced revenues without reduced spending," Gibbons said in his letter to superintendents.

State Budget Director Andrew Clinger said, "Part of the process when revenues come in less than expected is to go into belt-tightening mode. The governor has looked at the revenues and, in order to make the impact of this as minimal as we can, the decision was made to spread it out over more groups."

It is incumbent on public education superintendents to come to table and do their part, and Gibbons will listen to their concerns, Clinger said.

Clinger also said that since the 4.5 percent cut is only to the state appropriation it's his guess that the total cut to overall school budgets is actually closer to 2 percent after the districts' other sources of funding are factored in.

"Part of the process when revenues come in less than expected is to go into belt-tightening mode," Clinger said. "The governor has looked at the revenues and, in order to make the impact of this as minimal as we can, the decision was made to spread it out over more groups."

Lincoln County Superintendent Clark Hardy said that his district faces up to a $500,000 reduction to its $11 million general operating budget, which is big money to a rural district. Like most Nevada districts, about 86 percent of Lincoln's operating budget goes to pay employees, Hardy said. Any substantial cut to Lincoln County's budget would mean personnel reductions. Hardy said he's hoping the state finds a way to avert that.

"There's no panic yet," Hardy said. "We're taking a wait-and-see attitude."

In Clark County, the response to Gibbons's call for education cuts has angered parent groups and education advocates. Nevadans for Quality Education, a not-for-profit group, is organizing candlelight vigils to protest the cuts in Las Vegas, Henderson, Reno and Carson City. The two protests in Clark County are planned for 4:30 p.m. Wednesday at Bonanza High School, 6665 W. Del Rey Ave., and Greenspun Middle School, 140 N. Valle Verde Drive in Henderson. The Nevada Parent Teacher Association and the Clark County Education Association have been invited to participate.

"The governor said he was going to have one bold stroke for education," said NQE Vice President Mary Jo Parise-Malloy, recalling Gibbons' campaign as the "Education First" governor. "I didn't know that his one bold stroke was going to be to bludgeon education."

Review-Journal writer Sean Whaley contributed to this report. Contact reporter Lisa Kim Bach at lbach@reviewjournal.com or (702) 383-0287.