School District looks to slash $15 million

"Everything is on the table as far as I'm concerned," Superintendent Carol Comeau said Tuesday. "There is no protected anything."

Every year the district has to balance its proposed budget for the next school year, making sure expenditures equal revenues. But the $15 million difference for 2010-2011 is unusually large.

Programs and teaching positions might be cut. Class size might increase. Computers might not get replaced with newer models. Administrators will even consider boosting fees for things like parking or student instrument rental.

The reason for the unusually large gap, school officials say, is that city administrators are balking at asking Anchorage property owners to pay more taxes for the city's public schools. School officials have been criticized for allowing the district's budget to swell over the past decade despite a relatively static student population and a continuing dropout problem.

The city Assembly said it will not tax property owners to the amount allowed under municipal code and will let the district levy only the same amount of taxes it did this year, about $192 million.

But administrators say they can't operate next year with this year's budget because of rising wages for teachers and other employees, and higher prices for books, materials, fuels and other costs.

Local taxes pay about 30 percent of the district's general fund budget. The majority of the other money comes from the state, with a small percentage coming from the federal government.

School officials will hold a series of public meetings to ask parents, teachers and students for ideas on how to slim costs. The first forum is scheduled for 7 to 9 p.m. Nov. 16 at Mears Middle School. To find out more, go to: http://www.asdk12.org/events/CommunityForum.asp.

The schools' final budget proposal is due to the Assembly in March.

For years the School District had taxed property owners at the maximum allowed under city law, but for this school year's budget Assembly members said no. Acting Mayor Matt Claman vetoed that decision. Comeau said in order to avoid that again, board members are trying to work now with Assembly members; instead of telling the Assembly how much money the district will need, the district asked the Assembly how much money it can get.

"It's never been an issue," Comeau said of how the budget process worked in the past. "We've always been really clear ... that funding locally to our local tax cap was part of our assumptions. We've always been really public about that."

The local tax cap tends to grow every year because it is based on a formula that includes overall property value and population growth in Anchorage.

"As long as I've been on the board it's been unquestioned that they would allow us to tax to the cap," said six-year school board member Jeff Friedman.

Dipping into the School District's "fund balance," or emergency money, as the district has done in the past when in trouble is not an option, said board President John Steiner. That money is for emergency use only and needs to stay at a certain level to ensure the district's bond rating. Nor is the School District's boon of tens of millions of dollars in federal stimulus money going to help. That money is specifically earmarked for pilot, two-year programs and cannot be shifted to help with general fund shortfalls, administrators say.

Find Megan Holland online at adn.com/contact/mholland or call 257-4343.