The county schools won”t see their usual fleet of new buses this year.
City school buses soon may be owned and operated by an outside company.
Students will have fewer field trips; teachers will attend fewer workshops.
And when it comes to cutting salaries, support staff is first on the chopping block.
In these economic times, private industries aren”t the only ones making cutbacks. Local school districts also are in the business of saving money.
As a cost-saving measure, the Lowndes County School District and the Columbus Municipal School District have joined forces to provide alternative schooling.
The LCSD previously sent students to the Quad County Alternative School in Starkville, but now is using the alternative school in Columbus, a move which means “enormous savings,” said LCSD Superintendent Mike Halford.
“It has saved me, per child, and the mileage of going into Starkville each day,” he explained. “It”s a win-win for myself and for (CMSD Superintendent Dr. Del) Phillips. And it frees up some money for him (no longer) solely funding the alternative school.”
“We partnered with Lowndes County schools to provide alternative services, which saves both districts a substantial amount of money each year,” Phillips said, noting CMSD also has taken other measures to cut costs.
“We have been diligent over the last two years to make our system more efficient,” he said. “Several steps during that period have reduced our overall operating cost and bolstered our bottom line position to support the classroom. As always, we promote efficiency in the system, so we can direct as many dollars as possible to the classroom.”
CMSD has reduced support staff and non-classroom teachers, through attrition, a move which reduces “labor costs (and increases) the efficiency, per worker, in the system,” Phillips added.
“We have reduced the administrators in the system, especially central office administrators, by reassigning central office staff to building-level openings caused by attrition or combining job responsibilities when someone leaves a central office position,” he continued.
Additionally, the district has outsourced its food operation to Aramark “to generate a better product for our students, as well as produce a cost savings to the district,” and CMSD is reviewing bids to outsource transportation services, Phillips noted.
“We have worked every day, since my arrival in June of 2007, to make our system more responsive to the needs of our customers, while at the same time, making our system more efficient,” he said.
On the New Hope campuses of the LCSD, staff has been reduced by four employees.
“About 80 to 85 percent of our budget is (spent on) salaries,” Halford said. “If you”re going to cut a large amount of money, that is where you”re going to (do it). We haven”t remained status quo; we”ve made some changes where we”ve needed to make changes.”
The district”s transportation system is one area where changes have been made.
“In past years, we have tried to rotate our buses out and we”re not going to budget for the (new) buses in 2009-2010,” Halford said. “We are going to order one bus, but it”s simply to replace a bus (which was) wrecked. We”ve tried to improve our fleet of maintenance vehicles, but we”ve taken (new ones) out of the budget.
“In the last couple years, we”ve done some significant athletic improvements, but there”s been very little money above the regular athletic programs (this year),” he added, noting no (athletic) facility improvements are planned for this year.
The only major construction project in the district is repairing damage — from a January 2008 tornado — at the Caledonia schools campus.
The $2 million project includes a new middle school gym, and high school art, band, Building Trades and Allied Health classrooms.
Additionally, new lights were placed on the softball fields in Caledonia and New Hope and installed at the New Hope baseball and Caledonia soccer fields — a $283,400 project.
Stands will be added to the Caledonia home bleachers and the New Hope visitors” section of the football fields; the stands should be completed by late July, at a cost of $275,046.
And a new $442,717 softball field earlier was constructed for West Lowndes High School.
“There are some other things we”re looking at,” Halford said of other cost-saving measures. “We met with all of our principals in the sense of looking at it ”bare bones.” If the money is not there, we knew we”d need to cut (the service). If we”re getting (federal) stimulus money now, all we”re doing is pushing the shortfall back another year. We have a plan if we”re fully funded, but we also have a plan if we need to make cuts.
“What we”re trying to do in Lowndes County is look and make the cuts we need and protect the core classroom,” he continued. “We”ve had multiple requests (to add elective courses), but when you do that, you need additional teachers. We”re protecting the classroom first, at the expense of fringes.”
Oktibbeha County and Starkville
“In the Oktibbeha County School District, we are cutting back on field trips and professional travel,” said OCSD Superintendent James R. Covington Jr. “We have realized a savings this year in our fuel budget, because gas prices are down this year, compared to last year. We are constantly monitoring purchases, only purchasing those items that are a must. Other (items), we postpone them.”
Also as a cost-saving measure, OCSD will continue its partnership with the Starkville Quad County Alternative School.
“We are evaluating all physical operations for cost savings,” said Starkville School District Superintendent Judy Couey. “We are committed to keeping all instructional staff, but are examining add-ons closely. Supplements, additional duties and overtime in the personnel area will be reviewed. As employees resign, retire or leave the district, we are seeing if jobs can be combined or eliminated through attrition.”
West Point
Trying to save money is an old business for the West Point School District, which this year, was cut by $500,000 in Mississippi Adequate Education Program funds, noted WPSD Superintendent Steve Montgomery, adding officials don”t plan to cut any teachers or staff positions.
“This being business as usual for us, we have put a hold on some projects we were planning to do as far as building projects or renovations,” he said. “We”ve put a hold on some of those things, for now, to see what the funding is going to be for next year.
“We”re not going to add any new positions. We”ve had a few positions, where people have retired, that we”re just going to absorb and not replace those people right now. We”re just trying to hold what we”ve got and not spend for extra things, until we find out what the Legislature is going to do this year.”
The state”s general fund is projected to get about $4.6 billion in tax collections for the next fiscal year — $416 million less than what state government began with in the current fiscal year, according to the Legislative Budget Office.
The incoming federal funds will help alleviate the impact of state revenue shortfalls, but state legislators and education administrators have in recent weeks been trying to get a better handle on how much money there is and what the rules are for spending it.
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